I can say from experience that, in my opinion, some of the best romantic relationships are shared by two people who love sharing moments of chills and thrills with each other. In that same vein, I have a lot of respect and admiration for couples who have joined forces to create moments of chills and thrills for others, such as the stars and co-producers of Together, Dave Franco and Alison Brie.

The husband and wife duo are far from the first real-life couple to star in a horror movie together, and, because of the genuine onscreen chemistry they bring to the new 2025 movie, I sure hope they are not the last. In fact, let's begin my little breakdown of notable Hollywood power couples who made some great scary date movies over the years with the stars of Together.

Dave Franco And Alison Brie (Together)

Recent releases like the Oscar-winning The Substance and The Ugly Stepsister have paved the way for a golden era of body horror movies that continues with writer and director Michael Shanks' Together. The new horror movie stars the aforementioned Dave Franco and Alison Brie as Tim and Millie, who find themselves growing too close for comfort when a mysterious force causes them to be involuntarily bound by flesh.

Echoing Eric Eisenberg's Together review, Franco and Brie portray the troubling circumstances of their characters' relationship, even those existing before the supernatural starts to make things worse, so flawlessly that you can't help but wonder about the state of their actual marriage. Of course, by the end, it becomes clear they possess more than enough chemistry to make this bizarre and unsettling, but also funny and even heartwarming thriller a satisfying and touching experience.

John Krasinski And Emily Blunt (A Quiet Place)

I believe 2018's A Quiet Place boasts one of the most astonishingly unique concepts for an alien invasion movie I have ever seen: a world overrun with malevolent, non-seeing extra-terrestrials, forcing the remains of humanity to live in silence. However, I also believe the key to its unnerving effectiveness lies in the lead performances by John Krasinski (who also co-writes and directs) and Emily Blunt.

As Lee and Evelyn Abbott, the beloved power couple, who wed in 2010 and have since had two children, deliver a compelling and authentic sense of devotion to one another and desperation to protect their family at all costs. Had Krasinski not cast his own wife to play his onscreen partner, the film's man-versus-monster suspense could have easily lacked the breathless urgency that made it an instant sci-fi movie classic.

Jeff Goldblum And Geena Davis (The Fly)

Together is not the first body horror flick to star a real-life couple, but it might be the first to involve both romantic leads experiencing the same grotesque situation first-hand. In David Cronenberg's 1986 version of The Fly, Jeff Goldblum's Dr. Seth Brundle slowly becomes a half-human, half-insect hybrid while the love of his life, Ronnie Quaife (Geena Davis), only witnesses the dehumanizing process in shock and heartbreak.

Goldblum and Davis were engaged at the time they shot the revered horror movie remake, having actually met on the set of a 1985 horror-comedy movie called Transylvania 6-5000, and tied the knot the following year, only to split in 1990, according to People. Their genuine affection for each other, which appears to have survived their divorce, based on their 2024 SAG Awards appearance, explodes on the screen, cementing The Fly as one of horror's most unforgettable romantic tragedies.

David Arquette And Courtney Cox (The Scream Movies)

Watching the Scream movies in order is fascinating in the way the cleverly meta slasher franchise traces two notable timelines in pop culture. The subsequent films not only illustrate the modern evolution of the horror genre, but also that of the relationship between two of its most famous stars, David Arquette and Courteney Cox.

The Friends cast member, playing journalist Gale Weathers, and the Dewey Riley actor met on the set of the 1996 original, were dating while they shot the sequel (after some encouragement from Wes Craven), and were married during the third one, but had split before reprising their characters as husband and wife in 2011's Scream 4. However, Cox has since referred to Arquette as her "best friend "(according to People), and that shows in their willingness to reunite and play their roles as divorcees in 2022's Scream, which saw Dewey succumb to Ghostface's knife. However, Arquette has somehow been cast in Scream 7, so it looks like the reign of Dewey and Gale is, thankfully, not over just yet.

Freddie Prinze Jr. And Sarah Michelle Gellar (I Know What You Did Last Summer)

Scream is not the only '90s slasher movie favorite from which romance bloomed behind the scenes. In I Know What You Did Last Summer, Freddie Prinze Jr.'s Ray Bronson may have been dating Jennifer Love Hewitt's Julie James, but the actor really had his eye on their co-star, Sarah Michelle Gellar.

After falling in love on the set of the 1997 thriller, they would later wed in 2002, which is the same year they shared a kiss as Fred and Daphne in the first live-action Scooby-Doo movie. Since Gellar's Helen did not survive the first Summer, the couple was not able to reunite for the arguably more fun 1998 sequel, but she would make a surprise cameo in the 2025 reboot, achieved through a dream sequence, that also allowed her and Prinze the opportunity to have a fun family trip in Australia, where the legacyquel as filmed, as she shared with the country's iteration of Today.

Eli Roth And Lorenza Izzo (Aftershock)

Until their divorce in 2018 after four years of marriage, horror multi-hyphenate Eli Roth and actor and model Lorenza Izzo were one of the genre's top power couples, collaborating on projects like Netflix's Hemlock Grove, The Green Inferno, Knock Knock, and The House with a Clock in Its Walls. Their personal and professional relationship began with a disaster thriller from 2012 called Aftershock.

In addition to co-writing and producing the thriller from director Nicolás López, Roth stars alongside Izzo as survivors of a deadly earthquake in Chile struggling to make it out of the ruined city safely. The Chilean-born actor shared with WWD that she was cast in a leading role when Roth discovered she could speak English and, after spending the entire shoot together and boasting a chemistry that comes through effectively in the film, they became more than scene partners.

It is celebrity couples like these, in addition to the likes of Stranger Things' Charlie Heaton and Natalia Dyer, who prove to me that sometimes the key to a great horror movie, especially ones in which romance plays a pivotal role, is casting two people whose love offscreen is so strong, it's scary.

A Minecraft Movie has been dominating the box office, less than a year after Borderlands was predicted to be the upcoming video game movie that would bring big success to Lionsgate and director Eli Roth. With a star-packed cast, the adaptation of the beloved video game franchise had blockbuster potential written all over it, but delays, pandemic complications, and behind-the-scenes struggles meant the film fell far short of expectations, and it was obliterated by critics. Now, the Cabin Fever helmer spoke with brutally honesty about the experience and what it taught him.

Speaking on The Town podcast hosted by Matthew Belloni, Roth broke down the chaotic journey of Borderlands, explaining how COVID disruptions, scattered production schedules, and studio demands left him in unfamiliar territory, even when it came to watching the final cut of the movie. He shared:

It’s a really straightforward take on how unpredictable the whole process turned out to be. Roth’s time with Borderlands wasn’t just tough, it was something he’d never faced before as a filmmaker who usually has a solid grip on his vision.

Borderlands' Behind-the-Scenes Chaos

Eli Roth wasn’t even involved in the film’s reshoots, having moved on to his slasher Thanksgiving during that time. He admitted that while he didn’t hold any grudges about the process, it highlighted just how out of step the production had become. He continued:

The reshoots, paired with an attempt to secure a PG-13 rating, despite the R-rated cut allegedly blowing people's minds, meant Borderlands ended up far from The Green Inferno directors’ usual brand of gritty, genre-driven storytelling. And COVID didn’t help either. The film went into pre-production in 2020, with cameras rolling in 2021, right in the middle of lockdowns and strict health protocols. The Hostel creator shared:

That's relatable. I think COVID was more complicated than any of us could have imagined, and that's not having to prep a movie.

Borderlands’ Poor Box Office Performance

Despite an A-list cast including Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, and Jack Black, Borderlands failed to draw the crowds that Lionsgate was banking on. With a production budget reportedly around $115 million, the film only managed to bring in $33 million at the global box office, a disappointing return for what was expected to be a major franchise-starter. Roth didn’t dodge the reality, admitting:

When Borderlands finally debuted, it landed with more of a thud than a bang, especially compared to other 2024 gaming adaptations like Five Nights at Freddy’s or The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which were massive hits.

The Inglorious Basterds alum’s remarks show a mix of humility and the tough lessons learned from making movies after the pandemic. It wasn't just a matter of bad timing; it was a perfect storm of scheduling issues, coordination struggles, and external pressure. A lot can go wrong during filming, especially when it takes three years to wrap up a project like this one.

Despite the box office stumble, Roth remains a respected voice in genre filmmaking, and his honesty about the experience is refreshing. The director's next big project is an upcoming horror movie, and yep, you guessed it: it's the greenlit sequel to Thanksgiving.

It's not unusual for directors to star in their own movies. Alfred Hitchcock famously made cameos in almost all of his movies and Quentin Tarantino appears in all of his in one way or another. It's rarer for a director to appear in a fellow director's movie. It's hardly unheard of, as we found plenty of interesting examples. So without further ado, here is our list of directors who appeared on other directors' movies.

Steven Spielberg - The Blues Brothers

Before the tragic accident on the set of The Twilight Zone, John Landis and Steven Spielberg were good friends. So good, in fact, that Spielberg showed up in a cameo in the Landis classic The Blues Brothers. Spielberg plays the Cook Country Accessor at the end of the movie who takes payment from Jake and Elwood.

David Lynch - The Fablemans

In a very meta moment, David Lynch plays another great director, John Ford, in Steven Spielberg's The Fablemans. The late Lynch didn't show up in movies often, even his own, so it's a fun moment in a movie by a legend, starring a legend as a legend.

John Landis - Spider-man 2

John Landis has twice done cameos in Sam Rami movies, both times appearing as a doctor, the most famous of which was in Spider-Man 2 where he plays a doctor killed by Doctor Octopus after performing surgery on the villain. It's a super quick moment and one that is easy to miss.

David Fincher - Being John Malkovich

David Fincher has occasionally popped into his own movies, including playing the voice of John Doe on the telephone so as to not give away the surprise later. He also has shown up in other directors' movies, specifically as a puppet expert in Spike Jonze's Being John Malkovich.

Roger Corman - The Silence Of The Lambs

Legendary B-movie director Roger Corman has a habit of showing up in other directors' work. It makes sense as he's a huge hero to many filmmakers who grew up watching his movies. In Jonathan Demme's The Silence of the Lambs, Corman plays the FBI director in one scene.

George Lucas - Beverly Hills Cop III

Beverly Hills Cop 3 is a pretty terrible movie, though thankfully the franchise was redeemed decades later with Axel F. Still, there is a pretty funny cameo in the movie when none other than George Lucas pops into the movie as a disgruntled patron of the amusement park that is central to the story.

Tim Burton - Singles

Tim Burton is not a director that shows up on the other side of the camera very often. In fact he has fleetingly few acting roles, but he does appear in Cameron Crowe's Singles. Crowe also has a cameo himself in the film.

Sam Raimi - Miller's Crossing

Sam Raimi is a director with a lot of acting roles on his resume, in his own film and in the movies by friends of his. One such cameo is in Miller's Crossing, a movie by the Coen Brothers. Raimi also has a cameo in another Coen Brothers movie, The Hudsucker Proxy.

Gus Van Sant - The Canyons

Gus Van Sant has a bit more than just a cameo in The Canyons, a movie that flew way under the radar when it was released in 2013, starring Lindsey Lohan. Van Sant plays a psychologist in the movie and has more than a couple lines, unlike many on this list.

Quentin Tarantino - Sleep With Me

Quentin Tarantino is always happy to cast himself in his own movies, but even before he was one of the premiere directors in Hollywood, he was popping up in movies he didn't direct. In Sleep With Me, by director Rory Kelly, which came out a month before Pulp Fiction, Tarantino has a memorable moment as a chatty party guest who breaks down the movie Top Gun in a very unconventional way.

Martin Scorsese - Quiz Show

Martin Scorsese's most famous on screen moment is as a rider in Travis' (Robert De Niro) cab in his own movie, Taxi Driver. He also shows up in Qui Show, directed by Robert Redford.

Tobe Hooper - Sleepwalkers

Tobe Hooper is a horror movie legend for his work directing the slasher classic The Texas Chainsaw Massacre in the 1970s. In 1992 he popped up in a cameo working alongside Stephen King in the adaptation of King's novel Sleepwalkers.

John Waters - Something Wild

Director John Waters has been in many of his own movies, but he occasionally shows up in other movies as well, like Something Wild by director Jonathan Demme in 1986. Waters plays a sketchy car dealer in the movie and is one of the most fun parts of the movie.

Amy Heckerling - Into The Night

1985's Into the Night was John Landis' return to directing after being cleared of manslaughter charges as a result of the on-set tragedy during the filming of The Twilight Zone movie. In the movie, another director, Amy Heckerling, shows up in a cameo as a waitress.

Jonathan Demme - That Thing You Do!

Appropriately Jonathan Demme, who had a number of directors appear in his films, plays a film director in That Thing You Do! It's a brief role, of course, and it is one of the only times the late Demme appeared in another director's film. Into the Night by John Landis being another.

Roger Corman - The Godfather Part II

Roger Corman, one of the most influential directors of all time had a few cameos over his career with one of the most memorable coming in The Godfather II, where he played one of the senators grilling Michael Corlene (Al Pacino) in the Francis Ford Coppola classic.

Spike Jonze - The Game

Before David Fincher returned the favor for Spike Jonze in Being John Malkovich, Jonze appeared in Fincher's The Game, one of the most underrated movies by a big-time director.

Wes Craven - Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back

The late Wes Craven appeared in movies or TV shows as an actor 24 times according to IMDB, though most of his movie appearances were in his own movies. One exception was when he appeared in Kevin Smith's Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back playing a version of himself directing a cartoonish version of Scream.

Frank Oz - Spies Like Us

Frank Oz has appeared as an actor in a bunch of movies, including The Blues Brothers, Trading Places, Knives Out, not to mention all his puppet and voice work over the years. One of his best cameos came in Spies Like Us where he played the proctor of a civil service exam. It's truly a classic and maybe the funniest moment in the movie.

Cameron Crowe - Minority Report

Cameron Crowe has a very brief cameo as a man on riding public transportation in Minority Report by director Steven Spielberg. If you blink - or aren't sure what he looks like - you're sure to miss the moment, but it's there. In fact, another Cameron, Cameron Diaz, is in the background of the same scene.

Robert Downey, Sr. - Boogie Nights

In his day, Robert Downey Sr. was pretty famous. Of course, that fame has been eclipsed by his son, but that doesn't mean he did carry a lot of respect within the industry even late in his life. Like when Paul Thomas Anderson worked him into a cameo in Boogie Nights.

Frank Darabont - King Kong

For many, The Shawshank Redemption is the best movie of the 1990s. It's director, Frank Darabont, doesn't make a cameo in Shawshank or any of his other movies, but he is very briefly in Peter Jackson's King Kong. It's another "blink-and-you-will-miss-it" kind of role.

Lawrence Kasdan - As Good As It Gets

Writer and director Lawrence Kasdan is most famous for writing both Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. He's also directed movies like Grand Canyon, The Big Chill, and Silverado. On rare occasions, he's taken acting roles like he did in As Good As It Gets, by director James L. Brooks of Simpsons fame. Kasdan plays a psychologist in the movie.

James Cameron - The Muse

The Muse, directed by Albert Brooks, features a handful of cameos by famous directors including Martin Scorsese and Rob Reiner. In a rare appearance on the other side camera is also director James Cameron, who only has a few acting credits to his name.

Mel Brooks - The Muppet Movie

it's certainly not surprising to see Mel Brooks on the big screen, but it is rare to see in a movie that he didn't write and direct. That's part of what makes his cameo in The Muppet Movie so much fun. The legendary EGOT winner plays the evil Professor Krassman who is working to control the minds of frogs. It's worth noting that despite his delightful performance, it's not one that contributed to his EGOT.

Eli Roth - Inglourious Basterds

Eli Roth is as much an actor as he is a director, though in recent years he's concentrated on the latter. Sure he appears in his own films, but he's also been a collaborator with Quentin Tarantino a couple of times, first in Death Proof and then in a more prominent role in Inglourious Basterds.

Jim Jarmusch - Sling Blade

Director Jim Jarmusch has a unique style as a director and so it makes sense he would appear in a movie with its own unique angle, Sling Blade, by director and actor Billy Bob Thornton. Jarmusch plays the server at a food truck in the movie, serving up French fried potaters.

David Cronenberg - Jason X

David Cronenberg has a long history with the Friday The 13th franchise, having directed an episode of Friday the 13th: The Series in 1988. He shows up in a cameo in Jason X.

John Sayles - Malcolm X

John Sayles has directed some great movies over the years including Eight Men Out and Passion Fish. He's also occasionally done a bit of acting, mostly in cameos like as a memorable FBI agent in Spike Lee's classic Malcolm X.

Werner Herzog - Jack Reacher

German director is never shy about being in front of the camera as he often appears in his own films and occasionally acts in other stuff, like playing a wonderful role on The Mandalorian on Disney Plus. He also makes a great cameo in the Tom Cruise-led Jack Reacher from 2012.

Martin Brest - Fast Times At Ridgemont High

Before Martin Brest hit the big time as a director of such '80s classics as Beverly Hills Cop and the criminally underrated Midnight Run, he scored a small acting role as a coroner in Fast Times At Ridgemont High by director Amy Heckerling.

Orson Welles - The Muppet Movie

Mel Brooks has a fairly substantial role in The Muppet Movie, but he's not the only director to appear in the movie. Hollywood legend Orson Welles also appears in the movie. Welles was a huge fan of Jim Henson and the Muppets and worked with them on more than one occassion as well.

In CinemaBlend's Borderlands review, the movie is referred to as “a total mess” and most critics seem to agree. The film also came in fourth at the box office during its opening weekend, during which Deadpool & Wolverine threepeated at No. 1. Despite being highly anticipated as an upcoming video game adaptation, general audiences didn't seem to excited about it either. Part of that may have been that audiences were likely expecting a more over-the-top and violent movie and, apparently, they could've received just that.

The theatrical cut of Borderlands is rated PG-13, a fact that surprised and upset some fans of the games who were hoping to see the (occasionally cartoonish) hyper-violent sequences from the video games recreated in the movie. That didn’t happen, but the film’s stunt coordinator, Jimmy O’Dee, recently told ScreenRant that when the movie was being filmed, it was being shot as if it was going to be R-rated. And that came complete with exploding heads and severed limbs. O’Dee explained…

This is very much the sort of movie that many were expecting when it was announced that Eli Roth would be directing Borderlands. The man is known for horror, and it was expected that he’d bring those sensibilities to the plaent of Pandora. Jimmy O’Dee indicates that’s exactly what happened on set, with Roth himself suggesting more violence rather than less. O’Dee continued…

Which leads us to the question, just what the hell happened? If Eli Roth was more than willing to make a violent and gory Borderlands, why didn’t we get one? Was this a case of a studio looking to maximize profit by increasing the size of the potential audience with a lighter rating? Did Roth himself simply change his mind over the course of the three years it took to finish the film?

Is there an R-rated version of this film somewhere? It’s possible, depending on when these shifts took place, that there could be a completed cut of the film with all the gory glory. It’s also possible that post-production was never completed on an R-rated cut and everything is only half done.

None of this necessarily means that an R-rated Borderlands would automatically be a better movie than the cut that was released, of course. At the same time, if transforming the R-rated version into the PG-13 version required removing more than just the violence, maybe the original concept really was a better movie. It’s unlikely we’ll ever see it to find out, but if there are enough fans who care, maybe it could happen.

Borderlands, which is one of the biggest entries on the 2024 movie schedule, is now playing in theaters.

Coming off of one of the best years for video game movies with offerings like The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Gran Turismo and Five Nights at Freddy’s, the scene seemed all but set for projects like Borderlands to crush the 2024 movie schedule, especially with a cast that includes Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, Ariana Greenblatt, Jamie Lee Curtis and more. However, fans were given pause when it was learned the adaptation wouldn’t carry an R-rating, and those fears seemed to be warranted, as Eli Roth’s Borderlands has opened to a single-digit Rotten Tomatoes score and some pretty brutal comments from critics.

It definitely wasn’t a great sign for the movie adaptation of Borderlands when first reactions called it “repulsive dud.” As the sci-fi action comedy hits theaters on August 9, the movie holds a 6% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Let’s see what critics are saying, starting with CinemaBlend’s review of Borderlands. Eric Eisenberg rates the film just 1.5 stars out of 5, saying it was naive to ignore all of this film’s red flags, because it is “a total mess.” He explains:

Neil Smith of GamesRadar speaks to those red flags in his assessment — giving the movie 2 stars out of 5 — and warns fans of the video game that they may loathe this adaptation. Smith says:

Alison Foreman of IndieWire grades the movie a C-, saying the choice to make Borderlands a PG-13 movie and hire Eli Roth to do so resulted in a film that both betrays the hyper-violent video game that fans will be looking for and is still probably too mature for the younger audience who might enjoy the shallow story. Foreman writes:

Aaron Neuwirth of We Live Entertainment is one of many critics saying Eli Roth seemed to be going for the Guardian of the Galaxies misfit vibes. However, the critic says this project suggests no work was put into making the movie “funny, memorable, dramatically compelling” or interesting in any way. Neuwirth gives it a User Rating of 4, writing:

Another Guardians comparison comes from Matt Donato of IGN, who rates Borderlands an “Awful” 3 out of 10, calling it “a catastrophic disappointment” and a “hideous-as-sin recreation.” Donato writes that it’s an “inexcusably dull, one-dimensional chore of a movie [that] captures none of the creative chaos, exploration, or action-packed hilarity of the games that inspired it.” Yikes! And he continues:

From these and other critics’ reactions, it seems Borderlands may not end up on anybody’s list of best video game movies, but if you’re interested in seeing what Eli Roth’s latest movie is all about, you should definitely feel free to check it out and draw your own conclusions. The movie is in theaters now, and be sure to check out what other upcoming video game adaptations are in the works.

Call me an optimist, but I went into writer/director Eli Roth’s Borderlands hoping for a good time – and thusly ignoring its full assortment of red flags. I’ve seen a number of passable movies that underwent significant reshoots in post-production and/or sat on the shelf for an extended period, and not every film that doesn’t screen widely for critics should be instantly dismissed. There’s a talented ensemble put together on the screen, and while I can’t say that I am a fan of/familiar with the video game, I enjoyed the general vibe of the trailers.

As it turns out, you can not only call be an optimist, but also foolishly naïve. All of those red flags were wildly waving for a reason: Borderlands is a really bad movie. It’s a weird thing to be bashed over the head with constant exposition while failing to get a comprehensive idea of the world that is being established, and the only thing that ends up being more undeveloped than the story is the ensemble of characters – none of whom can even be called two-dimensional because that would be giving them too much credit. Its sensibilities are juvenile, its aesthetics are plastic, and there isn’t a solitary stretch during its 102 minute runtime when it accomplishes something creative or absorbing.

Cate Blanchett (the only person in the cast who can even modestly sell the material) stars as Lilith – a bounty hunter who is hired by a vague corporate executive named Atlas (Edgar Ramirez) to travel to a notorious planet called Pandora and rescue his daughter, Tina (Ariana Greenblatt), after she gets kidnapped by a soldier named Roland (Kevin Hart). When Lilith finds her targets, Atlas’ forces roll in, but the protagonists all decide to team up together for no discernable reason to fight back against them and go hunting for a mythic vault that is said to contain extremely advanced alien technology.

Also picked up along the way is a scarred, mask-wearing heavy named Krieg (Florian Munteanu), a personalityless scientist named Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis), and a silly robot named Claptrap (Jack Black)… who, at most, each make a single contribution to the story and then just become background noise/a name to feature on the poster.

Borderlands desperately wants to be Guardians Of The Galaxy but has none of the qualities that makes James Gunn’s movie so great.

With its band of not-so-heroic heroes and an energy that that takes direct aim at the nebulous concept of “edgy,” Borderlands screams of effort to be the Guardians of the Galaxy of video game movies, and it’s rather stunning to witness just how far off the mark it ends up. Temporarily putting aside the utter lack of wit or banter, the film seemingly forgets to provide even a single character with a compelling and/or special motivation; each one just sort of appears and becomes a part of the group moving from plot point to plot point. It’s also a wild waste of performing talent, as the stars are given nothing even remotely exciting to work with and don’t even provide their individual roles with personal flavor (it’s a very strange thing to see Kevin Hart play a generic soldier who doesn’t get the chance to elicit even a single laugh).

If a would-be blockbuster isn’t going to try and get you to care about the character’s goals, you’d hope that it would at least be fun to spend a couple hours with the personalities – but that’s just another arena in which Borderlands fails. There is overwhelming clichéd badassness that is reminiscent of bad action movies from the 2000s badly echoing bad action movies from the 1980s, and even simple gross-out gags like the protagonists being covered in piss and garbage feel played out and forced.

Above all else, what I’m most resentful of is that it inspires extreme feelings of annoyance via Jack Black’s performance. As someone who has been a fan of Black’s for his entire career, that hurts to say, but Claptrap reaches unbearable levels of obnoxious – which is admittedly the point of the character, but it’s far too effective.

One wishes that even a quarter of the energy spent on world-building in Borderlands was redirected into telling a competent story.

Not being someone who knows the Borderlands video game, I can’t specifically speak to how faithful it is to the source material – but I can say that I get the sense it tries to jam in as many references and callbacks as it can muster, much to the overall film’s detriment. Between lazy voice over narration, exposition-heavy dialogue, and mini plotlines, the movie desperately tries to suggest that audiences are being introduced to an expansive galaxy, but most of the material is either confusing to newcomers or hollow in the context of the story being told. Meanwhile, I have no idea why Krieg wears a mask/is referred to as a “psycho,” and when the plot finally gets moving 40 minutes into the runtime, it’s revealed that the characters are already in possession of two of the three keys they need to get into the aforementioned mythic vault. It’s a mess.

At a time when video game adaptations are finally starting to really click and work – the TV shows The Last Of Us and Fallout being prime examples from the last couple of years – Borderlands feels like a massive step in the wrong direction. It’s not instantly apparent on screen exactly what went wrong in the development of the movie, but you shouldn’t make the same mistake I did and ignore all of the red flags.

Cate Blanchett has done a fair number of auteur driven, critically acclaimed dramas like Tár, The Aviator, and Blue Jasmine. Now she is trying something different, and is taking on something more fun and wacky by playing Lilith in Eli Roth’s Borderlands. But even if the actress is known for her immaculate taste, she is telling audiences to not take her latest film too seriously. The actress opened up about some dumping on the movie before it’s even out, and praised her co-stars in the process.

In a recent interview with USA Today, Blanchett talked about her upcoming video game adaptation film, and why she joined the Borderlands cast. A mind like Eli Roth was a big motivator, as well as working with names like Jamie Lee Curtis and Gina Gershon. She lauded her co-stars performances and noted how fun the movie is, even if it won’t likely be associated with prestige. She said:

She also had a message to the naysayers, who haven’t been exactly kind to the movie. The film isn’t out yet, but early Borderlands reactions from creatives have called it a "dud," and haven't held back when predicting the movie’s failure. It's still too early to make a real call about the movie's quality, however signs aren't exactly positive. Blanchett defended the movie, saying it’s a good time and it was never intended to be an awards-worthy film. She continued:

The Lord of the Rings alum does have a point. A lot of films that were reviled when they first were released went on to find their audience and become cult classics. Fight Club, for example, was critically panned before later being considered one of the best movies of the '90s. The Rocky Horror Picture Show was another film that didn’t resonate when it first came out, and now is beloved by a very ardent fanbase. Even if Borderlands doesn’t hit this time around, there is still potential for it to live on in pop culture history.

However, this isn’t always the case. Borderlands already has a strong fanbase considering the game is so popular. Video game lovers can be awfully protective of big screen adaptations, and many are still hated amongst fans. It’s pretty agreed upon that Assassin’s Creed was a major misfire, and those Resident Evil films never quite worked. If Borderlands truly is as bad as early reviews are signaling, there’s always the “so bad it's good” genre of cult movie that could attract audiences to the theater. The movie hasn’t even come out yet, so we will have to wait to judge Borderlands to see if it hits with an audience more than critics.

You can see Cate Blanchett in Borderlands when it heads to theaters on August 9, 2024. Video game fans should also check out our feature on the best video game adaptations that you can check out now. For more information on other films hitting cinemas this year, make sure to consult our 2024 movie release schedule.

Are you ready to cry and scream once more? Hostel is getting a TV show, and this is what we know so far about it. 

That name might sound unfamiliar to some. I know that when we’re horror fans, we tend to focus on some of the best horror movies of all time, but Hostel is a horror franchise that has gone under the radar for a bit, considering that there have only been three movies and the first one was most certainly the most popular. However, it seems Hostel is taking the spinoff route because it’s getting a TV show. 

But, what is this new Hostel going to be about? And, who is going to star in it? Here is what we know so far about this horror reimagining. 

What Is The Hostel TV Show Premiere Date?

As of July 2024, there is no set premiere date for the Hostel TV show, which isn’t that surprising. The news was only confirmed that the show was happening in early June 2024, so if we already had a set release date, that would have been pretty shocking. 

With that being said, Hostel has always been a relatively low-budget franchise. It’s not like all these big upcoming Marvel movies or even some of the scarier horror films out there that need all these crazy effects. Hostel’s draw has always been the amount of gore and body horror they can really get away with when it comes to its main characters and the situations they are put in – and truth be told, that can easily be translated into a new TV series. 

This won’t be on any 2024 TV schedule, but maybe it wouldn’t be too far off to assume it might come out in 2025. Here’s hoping. 

The Hostel TV Show Cast

So, as of this writing, there is literally only one person confirmed to star in the show – and that, my friend, is Paul Giamatti, according to news from The Hollywood Reporter in June 2024. The star closed a deal to star in the upcoming series, where he will play a key role. 

Nothing else is known so far, but I just have a feeling that with Giamatti as the star of this new series, he’s going to end up rocking it. 

In fact, Giamatti has gone on record to say that he has wanted to work with Eli Roth (the creator of the new show and the film series) since the original film. In fact, they spoke about putting Giamatti in the original, but it didn’t “pan out,” according to an interview with Entertainment Weekly in January 2013:

Giamatti has been on a roll the last few years with some of his releases. The actor has had parts in shows like Billions, Rick and Morty, Nature, 30 Coins, and more, and has appeared in movies like Sideways, Straight Outta Compton, Saving Private Ryan, and many others. His most recent starring role in The Holdovers earned him an Academy Award nomination – and it was my favorite 2024 Best Picture nominee, even if Oppenheimer ended up winning over it. 

Yes, I think Giamatti as the star of this show is a great decision. I can’t wait to see what he does with this role and how terrifying he might become.

What The Hostel TV Show Will Be About

I’m sure that if you’ve watched Hostel – or are going to watch Hostel for the first time like I did a year ago – you’re wondering how something like that could be made into a television series. Thankfully, we do have some idea from the premise The Hollywood Reporter gave us. 

The Hostel TV show is being described as a “modern adaptation” of the classic 2005 movie and is marketed as an “elevated thriller” and a “reinvention.” I’m not entirely sure what this means for the plot of the film, but that’s literally all we know so far.

I'm not sure what exactly this means when they say it’s a “modern adaptation,” but I’m assuming that the new tech age of phones, trackers, and much more will probably be put into the new show somehow. Or the show will pull a fast one on us and completely subvert our expectations like most modern-day upcoming horror movies tend to do. 

I almost don’t want to know anything about this new show just to keep the suspense going, but I also know myself, and I know I won’t be that patient. 

Eli Roth And Several Producers Will Be Back To Work On It

The Hollywood Reporter also confirmed that Eli Roth, Chris Briggs, and Mike Fleiss are returning to the Hostel TV show. Roth and Briggs are writing the script, while all three will executive produce the series. Roth will also direct the show. 

For those who don’t remember, Roth wrote and directed the first and second Hostel. Chris Briggs and Mike Fleiss produced the movie alongside him. The one person missing from this line-up is Quentin Tarantino, who also produced the film, but considering we have three of the original producers, I think this new show is going to work out well. 

The Studio That Made Severance Will Be Making The Hostel TV Show

The last thing we know from The Hollywood Reporter is that the studio that developed and created Severance, Fifth Season, will be behind the Hostel TV show. This is a key piece of information, as the series doesn’t yet have a streamer attached to it, so for all we know, maybe Apple TV+ will be the home for it. 

Severance is one of the best Apple TV+ shows, and the platform itself has plenty of options for those to enjoy. However, it’s also important to say that Apple TV+, while one of the best streaming services out there, isn't necessarily known for having super graphic (bloody, gory, etc.) content. It has horror shows for sure, but nothing at this level. 

Maybe the series will be toned down to be on that platform, but there are many others out there that could take on this show. The studio has made shows and movies for other platforms, including Netflix, Amazon Prime, and more, so this Hostel  show may end up being one of the best shows to binge-watch on Netflix; who knows? 

What are you the most excited about when it comes to the Hostel TV show? All I know is that I’m going to be eager for whatever this show gives me – and how scary Paul Giamatti will turn out to be. 

Last year, co-writer and director Eli Roth fulfilled a childhood dream through the long-awaited film Thanksgiving. The results were impressive enough that Thanksgiving 2 was greenlit shortly after the Grindhouse-originated movie opened, which is something that I’m still pumped to see as a fan of Eli’s gleefully gruesome horror movie. But while we’re waiting to see when John Carver resumes his killing spree, Mr. Roth’s horror hit is returning this fall in a rather wild form. 

Horror merch company Stop The Killer Games has teamed up with the just as genre-focused clothing brand, Fright Rags, to bring the world a Thanksgiving board game! Pre-orders are now open for Thanksgiving: John Carver’s Carving Board Game, and just on a visual level this game looks like a surefire killer…of boredom! According to the official product description, here’s how this Thanksgiving-themed treat works:

I have to admit, the strategy behind Thanksgiving: John Carver’s Carving Board Game threw me for a loop. Seeing as I wrote our Thanksgiving review, having the knowledge I had on the film did leave me wondering how this was going to literally play out. And my initial expectation was that this was going to be a game where the object is to survive John Carver and their wrath. Simple, easy, similar to how Dead by Daylight or any other slasher game works. 

However, death actually plays a surprising part in the festivities for this game based on the critically beloved Thanksgiving. Not only are you encouraged to perish as often as possible, the most prolific victim of your party gets to become the head slasher in charge for one final showdown. Admittedly, this game designed by Eli Roth and Jon Cohn totally knows its audience, because making death a rewardable fate feeds the soul of anyone obsessed over what the world of upcoming horror movies has in store. 

I mean, you can make reckless choices that look cool while sacrificing your life to John Carver’s blade. Plus, the possibility that you just might be the one to wield it even keeps the mystery of Carver’s true identity in play each round. So if you want to play Thanksgiving’s board game while watching the film itself, you can do so without spoiling the flick for any potential newcomers. 

We’re still going to have to wait for John Carver’s Carving Board Game to set the table for horror, as it’s slated to ship out to its eager pre-order consumers this fall. But that doesn’t mean you can’t marinate in the vibes of Eli Roth’s slasher flick! Take a look at the game’s official commercial, shown below:

I don’t know about you, but all of this Thanksgiving talk has me hungry for seconds. Better still, I want to snag a copy of John Carver’s Carving Board and bring it to my family’s festivities. Considering how we like to watch movies and play games during holiday get-togethers, this could become a family tradition in the making. 

In the meantime, I’ll just remain patient for both this game and Thanksgiving 2, by revisiting the 2023 box office smash through my Netflix subscription and checking out the 2024 movie schedule to see what horror movies are coming out between now and the game's release. 

Ariana Greenblatt has been a standout since the first Borderlands trailer dropped, and by the sounds of things she picked a great movie as her breakthrough movie to film. Appearing in front of a large crowd at Lionsgate’s 2024 CinemaCon panel, she and director Eli Roth revealed how they absolutely had the best time on set ‘fucking’ with Jamie Lee Curtis and Kevin Hart with some inside jokes befitting a movie as offbeat and oddball as only the Borderlands movie adaptation could be. 

Roth spoke about Mad Max and a slew of other movies in the sci-fi genre influenced his idea of how Borderlands should come together, but when it came to the teenaged Greenblatt, the two got into some weird inspiration for her character. He had her watching My Dinner with Andre (a deeply philosophical movie about two men going to dinner and having differing world views) and Empire by Andy Warhol (which is just literally eight hours of the Empire State building being filmed.) 

Then, he had her listen to some Michael McDonald to prep for her character. But how did this mess with Kevin Hart and Jamie Lee Curtis? I’m getting there. 

Jamie Lee Curtis would see all of this going on and keep telling Roth, ‘What are you putting into that child’s head?’ But the director says the tact worked. Eventually, he was giving her notes directly adjacent to all this content they had running on the iPad all the time.

They might have been messing with the older and more established Borderlands cast, but it sounds like it helped her get into character as Tiny Tina when the movie was filming, which actually happened before Barbie filmed per Roth –the movie release date schedule is always a little wild like that. Barbie ended up being the first big film for Greenblatt, but it wasn't the first one she shot. 

It’s good to hear the cast had a blast making the movie, because the trailer for Borderlands we saw today had that tone and vibe, and it wasn’t just Greenblatt, the always-amusing Hart and Jamie Lee Curtis that seemed to be having a good time.

 Roth said he actually got leading lady Blanchett on board first, and then big names like Jack Black and everyone else already mentioned in this article jumped on board. Kevin Hart even got more insanely fit for the movie. Their excitement is infectious, and given we’ve been hearing about this movie for years now, it's great we'll be able to finally check it out when it hits theaters at the tail end of the summer on August 9, 2024. 

You can catch more Borderlands coverage and other great stuff with CinemaBlend's Lionsgate 2024 CinemaCon blog. 

The horror genre remains a fascinating mix of familiarity and envelope-pushing shocks. For every new chapter of the Scream franchise (and the problems that come with it), audiences are treated to wholly original surprises such as Talk to Me, Dream Scenario, Influencer… easily some of the best horror movies we managed to see in 2023. Eli Roth’s Thanksgiving walked the tightrope between the two halves, introducing a new slasher inspired by a Massachusetts pilgrim, but also figuring out how to franchise. After the film’s success, Sony Pictures quickly announced Thanksgiving 2, and now co-star Milo Manheim is opening up about what he wants to see in the sequel. 

Based on how gruesome Eli Roth’s Thanksgiving was, I’m relatively shocked anyone survived to appear in a sequel. The wicked John Carver laid waste to the town of Plymouth, though Jessica (Nell Verlaque) and her current boyfriend, Ryan (Manheim), made it to the end, and therefore are expected to be back on screen for Thanksgiving 2. When interviewing the duo on behalf of Thanksgiving arriving on Blu-ray and digital, we brought up the sequel, and asked Manheim what he’s hoping to see in Eli Roth’s follow up. He told me:

By that, he means he might get trampled in a Black Friday stampede, or cooked like a human turkey and carved up to be served like dinner… which are real things that happened in Thanksgiving. Eli Roth’s movie was wildly original, given the fact that it was based off this fake trailer that was included in the Grindhouse experiment conducted by Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez. 

And even though Eli Roth expressed some concern about casting a TikTok star like Addison Rae in his horror movie, the script and execution of the 1980s horror slasher homage worked extremely well, earned a lot of money, and earned the right to a sequel. 

You can grab Thanksgiving on Blu-ray and digital now. It’s great preparation for Thanksgiving 2, which is currently in the writing stage and hopes to get positive reviews like the one that we gave to Roth’s initial film. While we wait, scan the feature of upcoming 2024 movies to see what can keep you busy while you wait for Roth’s sequel to develop and release. 

Released just two weeks ago, Eli Roth's Thanksgiving has already established itself as another big win for the horror genre. In addition to the film earning the best critical response of Roth's career behind the camera (CinemaBlend's Mike Reyes delivering a four-star review), its low budget has allowed it to quickly become a box office success. With all this good stuff happening, the following news shouldn't be much of a surprise: Thanksgiving 2 is now in the works.

Eli Roth announced the sequel himself on his personal Instagram account. He posted a video saying that Thanksgiving 2 is "a go" and that he and co-writer Jeff Rendell are getting set to start working on the movie's screenplay. You can watch the director express his excitement over the development in the video below: 

Unlike some horror franchises of the past that have produced sequels just a single year after hitting box office gold (Scream, Saw, and Paranormal Activity to name a few), Thanksgiving 2 will not be arriving in time for Turkey Day in 2024. Instead, Eli Roth says that he and his co-writer are going to take their time developing a follow-up story. He says that the film will be arriving on the big screen worldwide in 2025, but he doesn't provide a date more specific than that (he says "probably around Thanksgiving"). 

This is notably the second time that a movie based on a "fake" trailer from Grindhouse has developed a sequel. Robert Rodriguez followed-up 2010's Machete with 2013's Machete Kills – though the world is still waiting for the promised conclusion of that trilogy: Machete Kills Again... In Space.

SPOILER WARNING: The rest of this article contains spoilers for Thanksgiving. If you have not yet seen the film and don't wish to know major details about the conclusion, click away now! 

Those who have seen the film know that Thanksgiving's ending most definitely sets up a follow-up story. After the reveal that Sheriff Eric Newlon (Patrick Dempsey) is the serial killer in the John Carver costume, he is taken down by Jessica Wright (Nell Verlaque), but he isn't killed. He gets engulfed in an explosion, but his body is missing when the smoke literally clears. It's assumed that he was basically cremated, but the film ends with Jessica having a nightmare about him making a vengeful return.

The video doesn't mention if Patrick Dempsey or Nell Verlaque will reprise their roles in Thanksgiving 2 let along any of the other actors who saw their characters survive the slayings of John Carver. Stay tuned here on CinemaBlend in the coming year for the latest updates about the project, including casting news, story details, and dates for the start of production. In the meantime, you can keep track of all of the scary films on the way in the coming weeks and months with our Upcoming Horror Movies guide.

Co-writer/director Eli Roth’s Thanksgiving took quite a while to become a reality. Debuting as a fake trailer with Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez’s Grindhouse double feature, Roth and his vision for a Turkey Day-themed slasher came from a personal place. Stretching all the way back to Roth's childhood, and now emerging onto the 2023 movie release schedule, here’s the story behind how Thanksgiving finally carved a path into theaters.

How Thanksgiving’s Original Trailer Came To Be

During Grindhouse's production, Tarantino and Rodriguez wanted to include a handful of fake trailers for other movies of the same milieu as Planet Terror and Death Proof. But before they even asked friend and contemporary Eli Roth to make a contribution, the Cabin Fever director had the idea for Thanksgiving cooking with friend and co-writer Jeff Rendell. 

When describing why this came to be, Roth’s story from the book Grindhouse: The Sleaze Filled Saga of an Exploitation Double Feature mentioned his own childhood in Plymouth, Massachusetts being a huge influence. Also, the following simple truth dawned on him as an avid fan of the horror genre: 

It was because of this that Eli Roth and Jeff Rendell were uniquely cut out to finally deliver a terrifying thriller set against a holiday that promotes bonding over food and massive Black Friday deals that have escalated into violence. But before that sort of news became commonplace, Roth and Rendell were having their own fun with the Pilgrim’s holiday.

Further along in the text of Eli Roth’s origin story, the man shared the fateful moment when he was asked to be a part of Grindhouse history. After getting the call to contribute a fake trailer, Roth moved into action with the following steps:  

Squeezing production into two days at the end of his schedule shooting Hostel: Part II, Prague doubled for Massachusetts, and Thanksgiving was born in its first iteration. According to more recent remarks from one of its fathers, the plan wasn’t always in place to make this movie into a full-fledged feature. For that to happen, a little extra persuasion was required. 

How Eli Roth Was “Shamed” Into Making Thanksgiving Into A Feature Film

The good news about making Thanksgiving was that Eli Roth and Jeff Rendell finally made the horror movie kills they’d had in mind since childhood come to life. Attached as part of the intermission that saw the trailers for Edgar Wright’s Don’t and Rob Zombie’s Werewolf Women of the S.S. entertain the Grindhouse crowd, their short, but brutal effort finally had form. 

However, the kinda/sorta bad news is that Roth and Rendell never initially intended to make a total film out of their slasher dreams. Revealing as much to THR, Eli Roth told the publication that the project only ever came to be because of this story of encouragement from the internet: 

It didn’t seem to take too long for the wheels to turn after Thanksgiving’s 2007 debut. In fact, when CinemaBlend’s own Eric Eisenberg interviewed Roth in 2010, he confirmed the script’s origins. With a fanbase looking for fresh meat, all would truly have to be carved to get this bird off the ground. And Eli Roth wasn’t looking to just cash in on a childhood dream either.  

In conversation during an AMC Theatres’ interview, Eli Roth admitted that the years after crafting that initial short had a huge hand in putting meat on the bones of Thanksgiving’s simple slasher short. Once again, the internet was something to be thankful for, as Roth revealed this crucial influence: 

Though that bawdy tongue-in-cheek tone didn’t leave Thanksgiving completely, it was dialed down in the favor of introducing an actual whodunnit/slasher rampage into the mix. The hard part would seem to be over at this point, but as any movie fan will tell you, this next twist is something that could have totally killed the project. 

The Hurdles That Needed To Be Cleared For Thanksgiving To Finally Happen

The final stop on the road to Thanksgiving was, of course, clearing it with the folks who helped make it happen. This meant that Eli Roth naturally wanted to reach out to Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, making sure that he was a-ok to proceed with this ambitious venture. With that also came the familiar sting of rights issues, as Roth explained thusly, in his THR interview: 

With all of the permissions locked in and a script secured with co-writer/friend Jeff Rendell, the table was set for all of the bloody trimmings celebrating an underserved cinematic holiday. The wait was totally worth it, as CinemaBlend’s Thanksgiving review and others pointed out just how fun the finished product turned out. Still, you don’t have to rely on the feedback of critics anymore.

You can currently catch the movie in theaters, as Eli Roth intended! And if you’re hungry for more carnage, the rundown of upcoming horror movies is exactly what you need to plot your next horrifying delight. Just remember, when all is said and done, there will be no leftovers.

For nearly two decades, fans of Eli Roth have been eagerly anticipating his latest horror movie venture, the holiday-centric slasher Thanksgiving. The excitement dates back to its playful tease as a fake trailer in Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino’s Grindhouse. Now that the film is finally here, early critical reception for Roth's latest has been generally positive. However, he openly acknowledged a genuine concern about production, mainly the casting of TikTok star Addison Rae. Roth specifically reflected upon a conversation he had with the media personality early on, during which he expressed a hesitation.

Eli Roth told The Hollywood Reporter that the online influencer-turned-successful He’s All That cast member approached him about joining his long-rumored Thanksgiving-themed slasher. And though he says he was open to the idea of casting Addison Rae, he was also very blunt with the online star. In his words:

One can definitely understand the concern. In the past, there have been many instances in which a famed person -- like an athlete or socialite -- has been tapped for a film merely to generate buzz. It's clear that, in this case, the Hostel director didn't want to cast the social media maven to drum up publicity but would only tap her if she had the chops. 

Thankfully, the initial concerns about stunt casting quickly dissipated as he witnessed the young star's commitment to proving herself in acting. As he explained to the trade, it also helped that he paired with some incredible on-screen partners, with Nell Verlaque, being one of them. He continued:

The movie takes an unexpected turn, deviating from its 2007 faux trailer roots. The once light-hearted tone has transformed into a sharp satire, delving into dark humor and even darker kills. Centered around the holiday institution of Black Friday, the film unfolds in Plymouth, Massachusetts, with a group of teenagers (Addison Rae, Milo Manheim, Jalen Thomas Brooks, and Nell Verlaque) finding themselves in the midst of a Thanksgiving gore fest. The enigmatic figure, John Carver, has a score to settle that's linked to a local big-box store, and it leads to an opening set-piece that redefines "doorbuster" and, inevitably, leaves a trail of corpses in its wake.

In CinemaBlend's Thanksgiving review, Mike Reyes gives the film a solid 4 out of 5 stars, emphasizing its worthiness after the anticipation. Reyes highlights the movie's successful blend of intense carnage and genuinely funny moments, a sentiment I wholeheartedly share. I enjoyed the film so much that I'm considering another trip to the cinemas to indulge in a second helping of holiday horror. And yes, Addison Rae does indeed deliver as well, and this could prove to be huge for her from a professional standpoint.

Catch her and her co-stars dodging the relentless John Carver in Thanksgiving, which is currently screening at a theater near you. Consult your local listings for showtimes. Also, remember to explore our list of upcoming horror movies to glimpse the chilling offerings gracing the 2023 movie release schedule and beyond.

Director Eli Roth joins to discuss his new slasher flick Thanksgiving, based on the incredible trailer from all the way back in Grindhouse. He talks about returning to direct horror for the first time in a decade, how they show the original trailer during Hostel 2’s production and what it’s been like working with Quentin Tarantino over the years. 

Also this week, we have our review of Thanksgiving, as well as The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes!

Timestamps (approx. only)

• 00:00:00 - Intro 
• 00:09:16 - Eli Roth Interview | ‘Thanksgiving’
• 00:41:44 - Review | ‘Thanksgiving’
• 00:56:05 - Review | ‘The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes’
• 01:07:33 - Outro

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This Eli Roth project has been over a decade in the making. The premise behind the upcoming slasher film Thanksgiving was first introduced as a fake trailer in the 2007 film Grindhouse, and is actually the third from the Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino movie to be adapted into a feature-length film (following Machete and Hobo with a Shotgun). Critics have seen the upcoming horror movie, which stars TikTok star Addison Rae alongside Grey’s Anatomy alum Patrick Dempsey, and they are all talking about the gore factor.

The gruesome first trailer for Thanksgiving shows the residents of Plymouth, Massachusetts, being terrorized by a serial killer called John Carver a year after a Black Friday riot that ended in several deaths. With this slasher sharing the same head of makeup and effects as The Boys’ bloody spinoff Gen V in Colin Penman, I’d say things are likely to get pretty sloppy this holiday. But let’s see what the critics are saying. In CinemaBlend’s review of Thanksgiving, Mike Reyes rates the film 4 out of 5 stars, saying this was a movie worth waiting for, with its carnage being balanced by some seriously funny moments. He continues:   

James Mottram of GamesRadar also gives Thanksgiving 4 stars out of 5, noting that Eli Roth hasn’t had this much fun in years, blending over-the-top gore with satire on consumerism for a sick and twisted final product. Mottram writes: 

Charlie Ridgely of ComicBook.com says Eli Roth’s trademark gore is put to good use, creating a modern and thoroughly entertaining movie with plenty of Grindhouse spirit. Ridgely rates Thanksgiving 4 out of 5, and says: 

Emma Kiely of Collider grades the holiday horror a B+, calling it a “gory blast” despite a pretty basic script and predictable twist. It delivers on its promise of creative kills, and if recent slashers have been too mild for you, Thanksgiving should satisfy that hunger. Kiely writes:  

Frank Scheck of THR says Eli Roth comes through with just enough “cheap kills” for his bloodthirsty audiences. The deaths are quite imaginative, Scheck writes, including a knifed cheerleader and the impaling of a parade driver. The critic continues:  

It sounds like those who are familiar with Eli Roth’s work are going to get what they came for in the gore department, when Thanksgiving hits the big screen. After waiting over a decade for this concept to be developed, the time has almost come, and fans can start their holiday feasting at the theater on Friday, November 17. Be sure to check out our 2023 movie release calendar to see what other movies are premiering through the end of the year. 

For writer/director Eli Roth, Thanksgiving is a passion project he’s held near and dear to his heart for a long time. Dreaming up a slasher horror film that would bridge the gap between Halloween and the holidays, the filmmaker and friend/screenwriter Jeff Rendell have been cooking up this idea for decades. 

With the fake trailer included in Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez’s Grindhouse acting as a sort of home stretch for the project, we’ve finally arrived at the point in time where Thanksgiving has arrived. No longer just a dream, it's now a major motion picture, and dear readers, it is absolutely worth the wait.

Thanksgiving is a bit different from what you might expect. For starters, the tone of that short and sweet entertainment from 2007 has morphed into a sharp satire that cuts deeper in the name of dark humor and even darker kills. And it all centers around a holiday institution that’s seen its fair share of true terror: Black Friday. 

A group of teenagers in Plymouth, Massachusetts (Addison Rae, Milo Manheim, Jalen Thomas Brooks, and Nell Verlaque) are smack dab in the middle of Thanksgiving’s killings, as the figure known as John Carver has a score to settle. It has something to do with a local big box store and an opening set-piece that redefines the word “doorbuster,” which naturally leaves some corpses in its wake. 

From that point, a quick moving, quick witted whodunnit plays out. With our young prey being selected for very specific reasons, and a town sheriff (Patrick Dempsey) trying to figure it all out himself, Thanksgiving keeps the actual procedural heart of any good slasher alive and beating. So while you’re not trying to figure out who John Carver really is, you’ll be plenty entertained by what’s being served.

In adapting this Grindhouse short, Eli Roth has turned Thanksgiving into a modern and topical horror delight.

Slightly updating the original concept into something more modern, Thanksgiving follows a group of high school teenagers who are, say it with me now, getting picked off one by one. It’s a traditional formula, and it works beautifully while also leaving room for innovation. This isn’t just a retread of the horny retro slasher that was shown in the original concept trailer, as it’s obvious that sort of movie wouldn’t play as wide as it may have in 2007.

Eli Roth has improved upon that kernel of an idea and built an actual horror-comedy offering that absolutely rocks. Integrating social media tomfoolery and Black Friday sale carnage into a good old fashioned revenge story, Eli Roth's latest return to horror is definitely built to welcome younger audiences into the fold. In a crazy way, his experience with his gateway family horror film The House with a Clock in its Walls probably helped Thanksgiving become the movie it is today. 

Much like the holiday it takes its inspiration from, everyone can gather around the table to enjoy this cinematic entry that heralds a holiday that doesn’t get much movie love. Fans of the fake trailer are going to be happy about seeing aster eggs, callbacks, and direct references ripped from Thanksgiving’s previous incarnation. 

Simultaneously, newcomers who are hankering for a well-balanced meal of gore-soaked kills and hilarious punchlines are also going to be satiated. You can clearly see where Thanksgiving started off in the finished product, but instead of resting on their rosemary, Eli Roth and Jeff Rendell scaled their dream into a timely terror that doesn’t forget to smile.

Thanksgiving gleefully walks a fine line between laughter and dread.

The genres of horror and comedy love to dance together, as screams and laughs swing to opposite ends of the emotional spectrum. Thanksgiving swings with great glee as it whips its axe in both arenas consistently and with a pacing that keeps things moving along. No joke robs the story of its importance, and no kill is above sprinkling some amusing notes that makes even a woman being chopped in half into a gag.

Succeeding with its balance of humor and horror, Thanksgiving lands some seriously funny moments. One of the best examples is a moment where a teen heartthrob reads his essay on why he won’t be celebrating Thanksgiving ever again. Almost immediately after closing his remarks, the girls fawn over him and call him ‘brave,’ while he wipes his tears with his shirt. Exposing six-pack abs in the process, the scene plays perfectly, and not too long before another sequence of killer John Carver stalking his prey through the halls of the local high school.

Which leads us to the horror portion of Thanksgiving: an exercise that’s just as brutal and bloody as the trailer that spawned it. But even with kills from Grindhouse being revised to be more elaborate (and in some cases more brutal), there’s still a story that weaves a web of intrigue connecting every horrific set piece. The infamous trampoline kill from the trailer is still here, and it’s still as lewd as it was in the past. That being said, the kill is slightly tweaked into a more vicious attack on its victims.

By time the third act goes full tilt into revealing the killer, Thanksgiving lets the unmasked party go totally wild. I’d even dare to say that actor is allowed to become more unhinged than they ever have been on camera. Question that claim all you want once you’ve seen the film yourself, but as that player savors their task in full view of the camera, it only makes the rousing climax into another example of the careful balance of laughs and menace this whole enterprise embodies. 

Eli Roth fulfills a long standing promise to his fans with Thanksgiving. 

Passion projects and “fake movies” are never guaranteed to be successes when fleshed out. Sometimes the tales we’re most excited to tell are better off as basic concepts than full length narratives. But when you get a movie like Thanksgiving that makes that sort of thing work like a charm, it’s a thing of beauty no matter what genre you’re into. 

Eli Roth has been living with this movie in his heart for some time, and now he and Jeff Rendell have given that dream form. Thanksgiving celebrates the time of year that makes us all reflect on what we’re grateful for while really making us consider just how “thankful” we are in our darkest hours. It’s not heavy-handed in that respect, but it certainly has a fine point at the end of its thematic blade, and it knows how to use it. 

As with any good horror movie, the door is left ambiguously open for Thanksgiving’s John Carver to continue. It would be a crime not to at least plant the seed for a potential future franchise that keeps delivering for the titular holiday. At the very least, Thanksgiving is primed to become an annual favorite that people throw into the rotation as soon as November rolls around. 

But the bones are so good on this movie that, if the fates allowed, the bloody fun can continue very easily. Sparing no victims, and promising no leftovers, Thanksgiving will have horror fans saying their blessings over the finest massacre to be served on the good flatware. 

Spring 2007 saw a movie event of rare style dropping into theaters through the double feature extravaganza known as Grindhouse. Alongside two main attractions from Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino came a handful of fake trailers that promised movies like Machete, Don’t, and Thanksgiving. With co-writer/director Eli Roth promising that last title in the line as a full feature for over a decade, the wait is finally over as this pipe dream is now an upcoming movie that horror fans can actually look forward to. 

Pitting the ever McDreamy Patrick Dempsey against this long awaited stalker, there's some fresh meat included with some leftover concepts from the original pitch. That much was seen as Sony recently unveiled this bountiful feast for the eyes, and it’s definitely a lot cleaner than the original Grindhouse variant promised. But don’t be fooled, as it still looks quite brutal and bloody, with scenes like the infamous trampoline kill still being present. 

What we know about Thanksgiving is that it’s a slasher flick set during the titular November holiday. That’s a simple enough pitch, and considering it’s themed after one of the lesser-celebrated holidays among big screen fare, it’s a novel enough idea. Roth started working on the idea around 2010, but as anyone invested in this saga will tell you, the road to becoming an actual movie was not so smooth. 

There has clearly been a bit of an evolution between the original “fake” trailer for Thanksgiving, and the ultra-crisp and modern version we see here. With the Grindhouse variant, Roth went for more of a sleazy old-school slasher vibe that felt more comfortable in the ‘70s. Using the grimy and beaten down celluloid aesthetic of film it was attached to, Michael Biehn played the role of the town sheriff, looking quite tough as nails in the process.

To get a better look at what I’m talking about, take a look at the original 2007 version of Eli Roth’s Thanksgiving. Though please note, it’s very NSFW, and you should take caution with where and how you watch:

Obviously, updating Thanksgiving means that a more modern audience can partake. That’s probably the same impetus that saw TikTok star Addison Rae cast in what looked like a fun set to shoot on. Rae’s photos of karaoke and other antics are certainly a sharp contrast from what we’ve seen above; though now I want to know if the actor behind the killer’s mask got in on that singing action. 

Kicking over to the more serious side of things, that’s also a huge difference in what we’ve got to look forward to in this harvest of horror. Thanksgiving is no longer a winking and nodding sendup of the holiday killer genre; it’s now playing as a legitimate upcoming horror movie. Which kind of explains the awesome casting Suits and Hostel vet Rick Hoffman as a loving dad, monologuing the true reasons for the season, as we see images of frightful murder appear on screen.

Though Thanksgiving is taking itself more seriously, Eli Roth's passion project still has that wild spark running underneath its more polished form. Comparing the vibes of the finished film and its more retro flavored origins is going to be all the more interesting to behold once this mysterious pilgrim finally carves up its unfortunate victims in theaters. You can take your place at the table starting November 17th, but make sure to leave room for dessert; which will probably be a jump scare sequel tease, to be honest.

Recent releases such as HBO’s The Last Of Us and The Super Mario Bros. Movie have seriously raised the bar when it comes to video game adaptations. Could Borderlands be the next great Hollywood project based on a popular video game? Well, now the countdown for the movie’s release can officially begin now that a release date among the 2024 movies has been revealed. 

Lionsgate has announced that Eli Roth’s Borderlands is going to hit theaters on August 9, 2024. The production wrapped filming back in summer 2021 in Budapest, Hungary, and it was announced early this year that two weeks of reshoots directed by Deadpool’s Tim Miller was set to take place, as Roth is currently tied up with his Grindhouse spinoff, Thanksgiving. 

Eli Roth was announced to be directing Borderlands back in early 2020, five years after news of a video game adaptation was first unveiled, with The Invisible Man’s Leigh Whannell reportedly writing and directing a movie. Borderlands is a first-person shooter shooter video game franchise set in a space Western setting that was first released in 2009, and has seen three sequels and a spinoff through Gearbox Software. 

With it being a couple years now since the Borderlands movie wrapped filming, we’ve been curious about when the movie would actually see the light of day. While it sounds like there’s a bit of changes occurring with the movie behind the scenes, Lionsgate must be finally confident to roll out the film. The Borderlands cast is oozing with talent, with the likes of Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, Edgar Ramirez, Ariana Greenblatt, Florian Munteanu and Jamie Lee Curtis starring. 

Blanchett is expected to lead the pack as Lilith, an infamous outlaw who reluctantly returns to her home planet of Pandora (not the Avatar one) to find the missing daughter of the universe’s “most powerful S.O.B, Atlas” as the official synopsis puts it. Ramirez will play Atlas, while Hart will play the role of Roland, Black will be Claptrap, Curtis will be Dr. Patricia Tannis, Greenblatt will be Tiny Tina and Munteanu will be Krieg. Back in summer 2021, Curtis showed off the first looks of the Borderlands characters on social media. 

The official release date puts Borderlands next to three other movies on the schedule right now, including the boxing biopic Flint Strong and the horror film, Speak No Evil. For the time being though, its biggest competition may very well be the latest Alien film, which is supposedly titled Alien: Romulus and expected to be released one week later. It should also be noted that Marvel's Captain America: Brave New World is set to hit theaters a couple of weeks before on July 26. We’ll see how Borderlands does across next year’s summer releases as we now await its August release. 

After what seems like years of headlines, revealing and expansive profiles about the ups and downs of the show’s production, and major on-set shakeups, HBO’s highly-anticipated The Idol has finally premiered. The new drama series tells a story of fame, excess, and identity with its saga about Lily-Rose Depp’s aspiring pop star and her complicated relationship with a self-help guru played by Abel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye, who also co-created the new series.

So, if you watched the show as it debuted, or plan on catching it later with your Max subscription, there’s a good chance you’re wondering where you’ve seen The Idol cast before. Well, we’re about to break down all the major players in this much talked about new arrival. 

Lily-Rose Depp (Jocelyn)

Lily-Rose Depp sits atop The Idol cast as Jocelyn, an up-and-coming pop star whose rise in fame and popularity is at the center of the show’s complex narrative.

The daughter of Johnny Depp and Vanessa Paradis, the young actress and model makes her TV debut with The Idol, though she has appeared in several high-profile film projects over the past few years. This includes roles in The Dancer, The King, Voyagers, and Silent Night. 

Abel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye (Tedros)

Abel Tesfaye, better known by his stage name, The Weeknd, co-leads The Idol cast as Tedros, a self-help guru who acts more like a cult leader than anything else.

Outside of his successful music career, which has led to the “Blinding Lights” singer performing at the Super Bowl, Coachella, and some of the biggest stadiums around the world, Tesfay has also made several film and TV appearances. This most notably includes a brief yet unforgettable cameo in Uncut Gems. 

Troye Sivan (Xander)

Next up is Troye Sivan, who appears as Xander, Jocelyn’s creative director and confidante.

If you recently watched X-Men Origins: Wolverine, then you’ll most likely recognize Sivan from his portrayal of a young James Howlet, a.k.a., Logan, from the 2009 Marvel movie. Since then, the singer and actor has appeared in movies like Boy Erased and Three Months. He has also made small-screen appearances on shows like Saturday Night Live, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, and multiple others. 

Da’Vine Joy Randolph 

Da’Vine Joy Randolph appears as Destiny, one of Jocelyn’s managers.

There are plenty of reasons why Randolph looks so familiar, and that’s because she’s appeared in movies like Dolemite Is My Name, The United States vs. Billie Holiday, The Lost City, and On the Come Up, to name a few. Her TV credits include turns on This Is Us, Empire, High Fidelity, People of Earth, Madagascar: A Little Wild, and most recently, Only Murders in the Building, in which she plays Detective Williams. 

Jennie Ruby Jane (Dyanne)

Jennie Ruby Jane stars as Dyanne, one of Jocelyn’s backup dancers who joins her on her rise to fame.

If you’re a fan of K-pop, you should be awfully familiar with Jane, as she is a member of the incredibly successful girl group Blackpink, in which she performs mononymously as Jennie. And, though she appeared on the 2018 Korean reality program Village Survival, the Eight, Jane is making her acting debut with her performance on The Idol. 

Suzanna Son (Chloe)

Suzanna Son shows up on The Idol as Chloe, one of Tedros’ many followers in the Los Angeles area.

Prior to joining The Idol cast, Son made a name for herself in the 2021 indie film, Red Rocket. 

Moses Sumney (Izaak)

Moses Sumney takes on the role of Izaak, another one of Tedros’ followers.

Like several other members of the show’s cast, The Idol is Sumney’s first acting gig. However, he’s had a rather successful music career the past decade, releasing multiple studio albums and making appearances with the likes of Tessa Thompson, Andrew Bird, Bon Iver, and Beck, to name a few. 

Jane Adams (Nikki)

Jane Adams portrays Nikki, an executive at Jocelyn’s record label.

One of the most established stars in the cast, Adams has made dozens of film and TV appearances throughout her career, including Happiness, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, Hung, Easy, and most recently, the Max original series, Hacks. Fans of You’ve Got Mail will also probably recognize Adams from her small part as Sydney Anne, the talk show host who flirts with Greg Kinnear’s character. 

Hank Azaria (Chaim)

Hank Azaria pops up as Chaim, another one of Jocelyn’s managers.

Probably best known for voicing countless iconic characters on The Simpsons, Azaria has also had a legendary career in a live-action capacity, as well. Over the years, he’s appeared in movies like Grosse Pointe Blank, The Birdcage, Heat, Mystery Men, Year One, and multiple others. His TV work is just as impressive with shows like Mad About You, Huff, Ray Donovan, Life & Beth, and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel under his belt. 

Hari Nef (Talia)

Hari Nef plays Talia, a reporter covering Jocelyn’s story.

Prior to landing a role on the new HBO show, Nef made a name for herself on the Amazon original series, Transparent, which she followed up with roles on You, Camping, And Just Like That…, and most recently, Extrapolations. Nef is also set to appear in the upcoming Barbie movie. 

Rachel Sennott (Leia)

Next up is Rachel Sennott, who takes on the role of Leia, Jocelyn’s best friend and trusty assistant.

Since giving her breakout performance in the 2020 dramedy, Shiva Baby, Sennott has continued to rise through the ranks of young Hollywood. In recent years, she’s appeared in everything from movies like Bodies Bodies Bodies and shows like Call Your Mother, with more on the way.  

Dan Levy

Multi-Primetime Emmy Award winner Dan Levy also appears on the series. The son of Canadian comedy legend Eugene Levy is best known for his turn as David Rose on Schitt’s Creek, though he does have numerous other credits to his name. Movies like Happiest Season, Admission, and Stage Fright have all given Levy time to show his comedy chops. He’s also slated to be in the upcoming Haunted Mansion movie later this summer.

Eli Roth

Horror director Eli Roth also appears, in his latest in a long line of acting gigs. In addition to directing movies like Cabin Fever, Hostel, Knock Knock, and The Green Inferno, Roth has shown off his acting chops in everything from Inglorious Basterds to The House with a Clock in Its Walls.

Ramsey

Ramsey joins the long list of The Idol cast members making their acting debut on the new show, as all of her work prior to the series’ debut has been in the world of music. Her track “Love Surrounds You” appeared during the first season of Euphoria.

Mike Dean

And then there is record producer Mike Dean, who makes his acting debut on The Idol. Prior to joining the show’s expansive cast, he made a name for himself working on seminal hip hop albums like Kayne West’s The College Dropout, Kid Cudi’s Man on the Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager, and Jay-Z and Kanye West’s Watch the Throne. He’s also worked on Beyoncé’s Lemonade, Frank Ocean’s Blonde, and countless others.

Well, that about wraps up the major players in The Idol cast. New episodes air Sunday nights on HBO and streaming on Max. If you want to know about the other great shows coming out in the next few months, check out our 2023 TV schedule.

Stream The Idol on Max.

At long last, Eli Roth's Thanksgiving is actually happening. It was all the way back in 2008 that Roth's idea for a Turkey Day-centric slasher film was previewed as a fake trailer in Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino's Grindhouse, and 15 years later, the movie is now just months away from hitting theaters. It's been a long journey for the project to get to this point, and it looks like the stars and filmmakers, including Addison Rae, are having a whole lot of fun together making it.

Rae, who made her feature acting debut in 2021 with the romantic comedy He's All That, has posted photos and a video on Instagram of some off-set fun she has been having with Eli Roth and co-stars Milo Manheim, Tomaso Sanelli, Nell Verlaque, and Patrick Dempsey. You can check out her post below, which went up with the caption, "Let dolls be dolls please."

Nell Verlaque also posted her own photos from the night on her Instagram, including a closer shot of everyone together at the dinner table:

It was all the way back in 2010 when Eli Roth and co-writer Jeff Rendell first started getting serious about making a real feature based on their fake Thanksgiving trailer, and though it took nearly a decade-and-a-half to get cameras rolling, principal photography began last month in Ontario, Canada. It was just shortly before the start of production that Addison Rae was added to the cast (Patrick Dempsey had already been attached at that point). In addition to Rae, Dempsey, Milo Manheim, Tomaso Sanelli, and Nell Verlaque, the gory slasher film will also star Jalen Thomas Brooks, Tim Dillon, Rick Hoffman and Gina Gershon.

Thanksgiving will be the second fake trailer from Grindhouse that actually ended up being produced as a real movie – the first being Robert Rodriguez's Machete (which even spawned a sequel: Machete Kills). Fans will remember that the other previews "attached" to the Robert Rodriguez-Quentin Tarantino double feature were Edgar Wright's Don't and Rob Zombie's Werewolf Women Of The S.S.

A loving parody of horror-centric holiday movies from the 1970s and 1980s like Halloween, April Fools Day, My Bloody Valentine and Black Christmas, Thanksgiving is set in the town of Plymouth, Massachusetts and will see a celebration of the titular holiday turn into a nightmare as a killer dressed as a pilgrim starts kidnapping and butchering people.

Our Thanksgiving Quick Things guide has all of the info you need about the film, which is presently set with a perfect release date: November 17. Expect a trailer to drop in the coming months (it will be fascinating to see how it compares to the version from Grindhouse), and stay tuned for more updates about the project. To learn about all of the other films set to come out in the months ahead, head over to our 2023 Movie Release Calendar, and if you're specifically interested in only scary stuff, our Upcoming Horror Movies feature has you covered.

Almost every major holiday has a horror movie associated with it — the most obvious examples being Halloween (synonymous with a beloved horror franchise) and Christmas (with how many scary movies set around the winter holidays there are). Yet, there are even a few that may surprise you, like all the romantic thrillers perfect for Valentine’s Day or the other celebratory seasons covered in the fun horror anthology movie, Holidays. However, one that does not get quite as much attention from the horror genre is Thanksgiving, which is why I am looking forward to Eli Roth’s next project.

To be perfectly honest, Thanksgiving will only be the latest flick to put a deadly spin on the otherwise heartwarming holiday, following 1987’s Blood Rage, the campy Thankskilling movies, and the two November-released installments of Blumhouse’s Into the Dark on Hulu, most notably. However, with a filmmaker of Roth’s notoriety involved, a few A-listers in the cast, and years of anticipation built-up already, this is looking to be the definitive thriller for horror-obsessed families to chow down on together each Turkey Day. See for yourself in our breakdown of all there is to know about this upcoming horror movie so far.

What Is The Thanksgiving Release Date?

Just as one might have been able to predict, Thanksgiving has been confirmed to appear on our 2023 movie schedule with a fall theatrical release. Sony Pictures revealed in a post on X that "all will be carved" on Friday, November 17, 2023. According to another X post from Sony, production on the film started cooking on March 17, 2023.

The Slasher Depicts The Deadly Events Following A Tragic Black Friday

If Thanksgiving is successful enough, it could go down in history as one of the best slasher movies of its time, let alone one of the best horror movies to take place on the titular holiday. However, Turkey Day is not the only annual fall tradition the film is taking a stab at.

According to Sony Pictures’ official logline, Thanksgiving takes place in Plymouth, Massachusetts – the site of the holiday’s historical origin – where a psychopath dressed as a pilgrim starts a murder spree in the wake of a tragic Black Friday riot. Even though it would not be the first horror film to deal with the notorious shopping event – Black Friday starring Bruce Campbell released in 2021 – a feature that explores how crazy some people get searching for deals the day after Thanksgiving sounds scary on its own.   

Thanksgiving Is Based On A Fake Trailer From Grindhouse

While Thanksgiving was only confirmed to be going into production in January 2023, fans have been waiting to see the movie since they saw the trailer… in 2007. The upcoming slasher is actually a feature-length adaptation of a faux teaser that was made specifically for Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez’s tribute to B-movie double features, Grindhouse, and shown in between the filmmakers’ respective, full-length segments, Planet Terror and Death Proof. See a taste of how this movie might “scare the stuffing out of you” by checking out the original, over-the-top short on YouTube.

Thanksgiving will, technically, be the third fake Grindhouse trailer to be made into a real movie if you count both 2010’s Machete — which spawned the 2013 sequel, Machete Kills — and 2011’s Hobo with a Shotgun, which is based on a short only shown with Grindhouse in Canada. It was in the same year that Rodriguez’s first Machete movie came out when Roth confirmed a feature-length version of his trailer was in the works. It only took 13 years for it to escape development hell and get fans excited to see blood hit the screen again.

Jalen Thomas Brooks And Nell Verlaque Lead The Thanksgiving Cast

Historically, horror movies have served as a breakthrough for many up-and-coming actors — some of which have gone on to be considered icons of the genre — and Thanksgiving could be yet another example. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the film will be led by The CW’s Walker cast member Jalen Thomas Brooks making his feature film debut, and Nell Verlaque, who is best known for the Disney+ original TV show, Big Shot.

The biggest names confirmed to be in the Thanksgiving cast, however, are Emmy-nominated former Grey’s Anatomy cast member Patrick Dempsey (whose last horror movie was the third installment of the Scream franchise in 2000) and TikTok star Addison Rae, who made her acting debut in 2021 with Netflix’s He’s All That. Also set to star — according to Deadline — are Showgirls’ Gina Gershon, comedian Tim Dillon, Suits’ Rick Hoffman (who last worked with Eli Roth on Hostel), and Milo Mannheim (whose last experiences with "horror" are Disney Channel’s Z-O-M-B-I-E-S movies and Paramount+’s School Spirits.

The Teaser Is A Warm Thanksgiving Greeting That Curdles Into Ice Cold Terror

I suppose it is only fair that the feature-length adaptation of a fake movie trailer gets its own new trailer (not to mention one that is more suitable for audiences than the one from Grindhouse). See how the first official teaser for Thanksgiving measures up to the faux trailer that inspired it by checking out the clip below:

The minute-long teaser boasts a very convincing lighthearted tone at first, with much credit to the sweeping score and charming monologue about the holiday’s best qualities by Rick Hoffman’s character, before serving up the scares. There are also plenty of fun references to the original Thanksgiving short, from the turkey mascot suit at the town parade to the cheerleader on the trampoline and, of course, the killer’s obligatory pilgrim outfit.

ELI ROTH IS CO-WRITING AND DIRECTING THANKSGIVING

As established, Grindhouse’s Thanksgiving segment was directed by Eli Roth, who also appears in the trailer as a very convincing looking teenager who loses his head while receiving… well, the same thing. Anyway, the filmmaker behind the Hostel movies is returning to helm the feature-length version, which will be his first horror movie in nearly a decade. In fact, according to Deadline, Roth had to hand off directorial duties for reshoots on his adaptation of the video game Borderlands to Deadpool director Tim Miller in order to get started on Thanksgiving.

Also according to Deadline, Roth penned the new movie with the short’s original co-writer, Jeff Rendell, who is also Roth’s co-producer on the film along with Roger Birnbaum. This will mark Roth’s third collaboration with Rendell, who also appeared in Cabin Fever as a “Fake Shemp” — a term meaning an on-set body double, coined by Evil Dead franchise creator and Three Stooges fan Sam Raimi — and played the killer in Thanksgiving. The pair also shared a Spike TV Scream Award win for Best “Screamplay” with Tarantino, Rodriguez, Edgar Wright, and Rob Zombie for their collective Grindhouse segments.

After Thanksgiving hits theaters in Fall 2023, that will leave only two fake trailers from Grindhouse that have not been made into real movies. Will we see Edgar Wright make his strange slasher, Don’t, a reality and would modern audiences even respond welcomingly to a feature-length adaptation of Rob Zombie’s Werewolf Women of the S.S.? Save room just in case.

In 2007, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino released Grindhouse, an experimental/double-feature experience featuring full-fledged fake trailers sandwiched between the two headlining movies, Planet Terror and Deathproof. The trailers included Machete, directed by Robert Rodriguez, Thanksgiving, directed by Eli Roth and many others. It may be hard to believe, but 16 years after Grindhouse was released in cinemas, Roth’s holiday pseudo-slasher will follow in Machete’s steps and get the big screen treatment. With each passing day, The Green Inferno director’s next project seems to be getting more exciting because now it’s been reported that TikTok star Addison Rae has joined the upcoming horror movie. 

According to Deadline, Eli Roth’s cast for Thanksgiving looks to be getting bigger and a bit more contemporary, as sources tell the outlet that Addison Rae has joined the film’s cast, joining the likes of Patrick Dempsey. Spyglass Media is set to produce the bloody flick, with Roth in the director’s chair and script duties going to Jeff Rendel, with the movie set to begin shooting in March. 

The Giallo films of Italy heavily inspired Roth’s original Thanksgiving trailer. It depicts a black-gloved slasher dressed like a pilgrim who terrorizes the inhabitants of a Massachusetts town that makes a big deal over the annual turkey day. The filmmaker’s fake slasher was so popular from the get-go that rumors have been circulating for the last 15 years about the feature-length version of the film. However, the project never materialized until now. Thanksgiving’s 2007 trailer is a fun and brutal send-up of 70s grindhouse horror and is worth watching. 

The trailer is a reasonably good mix of self-aware camp and stomach-turning gory goodness. I mean, a head-lopping pilgrim slasher killing in broad daylight? Sign me up! 

It’s unclear what role Addison Rae will play in Roth’s holiday slasher. However, the social media star recently signed a massive multi-million dollar deal with Netflix that rivals any major A-lister’s agreement with the streamer. Given her global status as an influencer and the success of her last film, He’s All That; it’s not hard to imagine she may be set to take up the role of Roth’s final girl. 

It was reported earlier this year by Deadline that Eli Roth left the production of the Borderlands film early to begin production on Thanksgiving. According to the outlet, he left two weeks of reshoots in the hands of Deadpool director Tim Miller. The director seemed eager to get the ball rolling on his killer pilgrim film.

Only time will tell whether Thanksgiving will be a worthy slasher in the vein of some of the best horror movies set on a holiday, like Halloween, My Bloody Valentine, or Friday the 13th. If there are any updates concerning the flick’s release, CinemaBlend will update you. Until then, check out our list of 2023 new movie releases to make plans for your next trip to the cinema. 

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I remember when Brad Pitt was easily the biggest name in the Inglourious Basterds cast (despite not actually being the main character) when it first came out in 2009. Arguably, he still is, but after Christoph Waltz earned his first Oscar, Diane Kruger became a household name, and Michael Fassbender and others started doing superhero movies, Quentin Tarantino’s World War II epic (very, very loosely inspired by the 1978 B-grade period piece The Inglorious Bastards) soon became a star-studded modern classic. Those stars have had a lot of notable movies, TV shows, and more on their plates since changing history with a loud bang, so, let’s see what they are up to these days, starting with our American hero.

Brad Pitt (Lt. Aldo “The Apache” Raine)

Technically, this superstar first collaborated with his Inglourious Basterds director for 1992’s Quentin Tarantino-penned, Tony Scott-directed True Romance before playing Lt. Aldo Raine (one of Brad Pitt’s most badass characters), and his Oscar-winning Once Upon a Time in Hollywood role as Cliff Booth.

He later starred in more grounded World War II-era dramas (2014’s Fury and Allied in 2016), sort of followed X-Men movies star Michael Fassbender’s footsteps by making one of the funniest superhero movie cameos as Vanisher, and even became The Jim Jefferies Show’s Weatherman on Comedy Central. Pitt is reuniting with Deadpool 2 director David Leitch for 2022’s Bullet Train (also starring his Lost City of D co-star Sandra Bullock), is teaming up with Damien Chazelle for the first time with Babylon, and has many upcoming producer credits, such as an adaptation of the horror graphic novel, Black Hole.

Mélanie Laurent (Shosanna Dreyfus)

I believe Inglourious Basterds’ true hero is Shosanna, played by Mélanie Laurent - who was previously known best for having Pierre Laurent, voice actor for the French-language version of The Simpsons, as a father. Playing the resilient Jewish refugee led to roles in more American films, such as the Academy Award-winning Beginners in 2010, the 2013 magic show/heist thriller combo Now You See Me, Denis Villeneuve’s Enemy the same year, a true Nazi-hunting story called Operation Finale, and two Netflix movies - including 6 Underground with Ryan Reynolds and Oxygen in 2021.

Laurent still stars in and even helms French-language films to this day, including The Mad Women’s Ball (premiering exclusively on Amazon Prime September 17, 2021), but also a new English-language directorial feature in the works, called The Nightingale, starring sisters Elle Fanning and Dakota Fanning.

Christoph Waltz (Col. Hans “The Jew Hunter” Landa)

Other than Hitler, of course, the biggest thorn in Aldo and Shosanna’s sides is Col. Hans Landa - played to Academy Award-winning perfection by Austrian-born Christoph Waltz, who also worked almost exclusively in Europe before Inglourious Basterds. Quentin Tarantino directed him in a second (and more heroic) Oscar-winning performance from 2012’s Django Unchained, before Waltz revisited his villainous talent in comedies like Horrible Bosses 2 or even series like Quibi’s Most Dangerous Game, to name a few, in addition to another kindly mentor role in Alita: Battle Angel from 2019.

Next, Waltz is starring in Wes Anderson’s The French Dispatch, reprising his Bond villain role in No Time to Die, playing Mikhail Gorbachev opposite Michael Douglas’ Ronald Regan in a miniseries about their 1986 meeting, and is voicing a fox for Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio, most notably.

Diane Kruger (Bridget Von Hammersmark)

Secretly working against Landa and the Third Reich is German actress Bridget von Hammersmark - played by German actress Diane Kruger, who actually broke into American cinema pretty early before landing starring roles in films like Troy (opposite Inglourious Basterds' Brad Pitt) and the National Treasure movies with Nicolas Cage. She would then go back and forth between playing more heroes (such as a Texas detective on FX’s The Bridge), more antagonists (like in the 2013 Stephenie Meyer movie The Host), and another World War II-inspired femme fatale in Robert Zemeckis’ Welcome to Marwen from 2018.

Netflix’s The 355 was originally set to be next of Kruger’s 2021 movies before it was postponed to the 2022 movies schedule and, unless Quibi’s serialized Swimming with Sharks remake does not find a new home soon, you will likely see her next in the romantic drama, First Love.

Eli Roth (Sgt. Donny “The Bear Jew” Donowitz)

While better known for directing and cameoing in horror movies, Eli Roth was appointed by friend and collaborator Quentin Tarantino (who helped produced the Hostel movies) to star in Inglourious Basterds as Sgt. Donny Donowitz and direct Nation’s Pride - the film-within-a-film where its premiere is the setting of the explosive third act. The director has since branched out slightly beyond his typical gore fests to dabble in the action genre (his 2018 Death Wish remake with Bruce Willis), and even family films (The House with a Clock in its Walls) and documentaries (Fin - his upcoming investigation of shark deaths). Speaking of, his AMC docuseries History of Horror has been renewed for a third season you can expect in 2021, and his adaptation of the popular video game Borderlands is expected to hit theaters the following year.

Michael Fassbender (Lt. Archie Hicox)

Appearing as British Army officer and Basterds ally Lt. Archie Hicox for less than 20 minutes in Inglourious Basterds was enough to pave the way for Michael Fassbender to become one of the most acclaimed and busiest actors of his time. Soon after, he would be cast in the Marvel movies (not the MCU, however) as Magneto, earn two Oscar nominations (for the Brad Pitt-produced 12 Years a Slave, and the Aaron Sorkin-penned Steve Jobs), tried his hand at video game movies with Assassin’s Creed, and joined the Alien movies franchise as two different android characters.

Fassbender will next star in Taika Waititi’s Next Goal Wins, appear in a feature-length sequel to the hit Kung Fury short, work with director David Fincher on The Killer, and rumors suggest Mel Gibson’s The Wild Bunch remake may be his latest western.

Daniel Brühl (Fredrick Zoller)

Playing Nazi turned film star Fredrick Zoller in Inglourious Basterds also proved to be a star-making turn for Daniel Brühl, whose biggest role in the American mainstream had been a small part in The Bourne Ultimatum in 2007. His next antagonistic role in a period piece was Formula One racer Niki Lauda (opposite Chris Hemsworth) in Rush before later playing a respectable 19th-Century psychiatrist on the TNT series The Alienist, for which he earned a Golden Globe nomination.

Brühl recently played Baron Zemo a second time in Disney+’s Falcon and the Winter Soldier cast, will star in a different sort of comic book flick with Matthew Vaughn’s Kingsman: The Secret Service prequel The King’s Man, and is re-enlisting into the German Army for the First World War with a new adaptation of All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque.

Til Schweiger (Sgt. Hugo Stiglitz)

While a fair share of American audiences might not have known Til Schweiger before Inglourious Basterds burned the name Hugo Stiglitz into their brains, he has been acting in English-language releases since the late 1990s, including 2003’s Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Cradle of Life opposite Angelina Jolie, and the raunchy Rob Schneider comedy Deuce Bigalow: European Gigalo in 2005.

Despite his subsequent fame from films like 2011’s The Three Musketeers or Muppets Most Wanted in 2014 (both also starring Christoph Waltz), the German actor and filmmaker’s most recent American film appearance was in Atomic Blonde from 2018. However, he is still working steadily in front of and behind the camera and will soon appear alongside the likes of Ben Foster and Michael Caine in Medieval - a retelling of Jan Ziska’s defeat of the Teutonic Order and the Holy Roman Empire in the 14th Century.

B.J. Novak (Smithson "The Little Man" Utivich)

Also known for his work in front of and behind the camera is B.J. Novak, who was best known as a writer, director, and star of The Office cast before playing the unfortunately nicknamed Smithson Utivich in Inglourious Basterds. He would later follow-up his tenure as Ryan Howard by trying his hand at comic book movies (The Amazing Spider-Man 2), biopics directed by John Lee Hancock (Disney’s Saving Mister Banks in 2013 and 2016’s The Founder), and other TV shows like HBO’s The Newsroom or The Mindy Project, which his friend Mindy Kaling created and starred on.

Novak created an anthology series called The Premise (formerly known as Platform) that is premiering to FX in September 2021 and is working on his feature-length debut as a writer and director with the horror film Vengeance, which is currently set for a 2021 release as well.

Mike Myers (Gen. Ed Fenech)

Another Inglourious Basterds star who broke out on a popular comedy series is Saturday Night Live cast veteran Mike Myers, who became one of the most famous comedians in the world thanks to characters like Wayne from Wayne’s World as well as lending his voice to the Shrek movies as the titular Ogre. Thus, it was quite surprising for the almost completely unrecognizable Canadian to make a cameo in a Quentin Tarantino movie until going undercover become more of his thing, such when he hosted the Gong Show reboot as Tommy Maitland or appeared in Bohemian Rhapsody as a fictional record producer. Myers is currently working on Oscar-nominated Silver Linings Playbook director David O. Russell’s next film and developing a Netflix original comedy series reportedly called The Pentaverate, but whether or not we should expect Austin Powers 4 remains to be determined.

Few filmmakers know how to put a movie cast together as well as Quentin Tarantino. In terms of using each actor appropriately and to the best of their talents, and propelling a few members into extremely successful careers, the Inglourious Basterds cast just may be his masterpiece.

There does not appear to be any kind of social media embargo on the set of the upcoming film based on the video game Borderlands – and that's particularly apparent when you look at the social media accounts of the stars. Jamie Lee Curtis in particular has been sharing photos regularly and providing followers and movie-goers with a sneak peek at the blockbuster, with posts about everything from size differential in her co-stars, to COVID-19 protocols, to jokes about the yogurt for which she used to be the spokesperson.

Her latest share is most definitely the best one yet, however, as the Halloween actor has provided Borderlands fans with a silhouetted first peek at Cate Blanchett's look as Lilith. Check out the post from her Instagram page below:

Cate Blanchett is certainly no novice when it comes to the world of blockbuster moviemaking, having played Galadriel in Peter Jackson's Middle-earth franchise and Hela in Taika Waititi's Thor: Ragnarok, but even just this photo suggests that she'll be giving off a fresh new vibe in Borderlands, and that is tremendously exciting. As described by Jamie Lee Curtis in the caption, Lilith is the film's "legendary heroine, psycho blasting, vault hunting, vixen with a bad attitude," and given Blanchett's extreme talent it should be a blast to watch.

Certainly only making us more hyped is also the tease of more to come that Curtis writes about. The fact that the image hasn't been removed yet is a pretty clear signal that the studio approves of it (it probably would have disappeared in a manner of seconds otherwise), and that's surely only going to encourage the star to post even more shots of her co-stars in the coming days/weeks. The caption suggests that she will be the one who gives us our first looks at Kevin Hart as Roland, Ariana Greenblatt as Tiny Tina, Florian Munteanu as Krieg, Jack Black as Claptrap, and herself in character as Tannis. So look forward to that!

Directed by Eli Roth, Borderlands is a sci-fi action adventure that will follow Cate Blanchett's Lilith as she returns to her home planet while on a mission to find the daughter of the most powerful man in the universe – teaming up with ragtag group of heroes to help get the job done. In addition to the aforementioned actors, the video game blockbuster also stars Edgar Ramirez, Haley Bennett, Gina Gershon, Cheyenne Jackson, and Bobby Lee. Lionsgate is producing the film and will be distributing the blockbuster, but the studio has not yet announced a release date. We here at CinemaBlend will be eagerly awaiting the arrival of new teases posted by Jamie Lee Curtis, so be on the look out for those and more updates about the movie as it continues to move through production.

Ghost Adventures has outlasted many paranormal investigation docuseries in its near 13-year run precisely because Zak Bagans and his team explore all manner of real-life spine-chilling horrors: ghosts, aliens, demonic possessions, legends and creatures, and the list goes on and on. But now the master of nonfictional horror is teaming up with the master of fictional horror, Eli Roth, for a spooky new TV show, and I’m totally here for it.

Zak Bagans and Eli Roth’s new horror project was greenlit by Discovery+ and will be called The Haunted Museum, based on Bagans’ real-life museum of the same name. The show will feature the haunted collectibles and artifacts housed at the museum, as told in part by scripted “mini horror” shorts by Roth and using Bagans’ own signature commentary.

The series will have an initial two-hour special, followed by eight hour-long episodes. A select few of the most notorious artifacts from the 14,000-square foot museum will be featured on The Haunted Museum anthology series, such as the Dybbuk Box and the Devil’s Rocking Chair. About the collaboration, Zak Bagans said,

Fans of Ghost Adventures will certainly remember some of these haunted objects from previous investigations. The Dybbuk Box, which is said to house an evil spirit, was the inspiration behind the 2012 film The Possession before it came into Zak Bagans’ hands. Bagans even opened it on camera during his Deadly Possessions series, resulting in some very creepy pieces of paranormal evidence, corroborated by guest at the time Post Malone. The new show, with Eli Roth at the helm, seems to be promising a deeper and more terrifying look into these incredibly haunted objects.

This wouldn’t be the first time the Zak Bagans creeptastic universe has expanded. Ghost Adventures has had several offshoots over the years. Along with Deadly Possessions, there was also the Demon House special, which focused on the team’s investigation of a haunted property specifically bought by Bagans for its alleged supernatural entities. Eli Roth, who’s currently directing the sci-fi comedy film Borderlands, says he’s been a longtime fan of Bagans and his penchant for the supernatural, prompting the collaboration. Roth said,

It's one thing to see the glowing orbs and whispered EVPs on Ghost Adventures. It’s a whole other ballgame to accompany them with Eli Roth's fists-and-blood kind of storytelling. Let’s just hope it’s not a Cabin Fever remake repeat. The Haunted Museum will launch later this year on Discovery+.

If you’re interested in the Borderlands movie, here is what we know so far. 

There ain't no rest for the wicked. It was only a matter of time before Borderlands found its way onto the big screen. Gearbox Software's space-western sci-fi shooter game was ripe for a bonkers movie adaptation, and we'll soon get it from director Eli Roth. 

With an all-star cast — including Cate Blanchett, Jack Black, and Jamie Lee Curtis — attached for this out-of-this-world ride, Borderlands has the potential to be an excellent video game adaptation. That being said, here's what we know about Eli Roth's Borderlands.

What Is The Borderlands Release Date?

Get ready, because Borderlands is releasing on August 9, 2024, according to Deadline. The movie was originally talked about almost eight years ago in 2015, and now, it finally has a release date. 

This is major news. We can at least look forward to Borderlands appearing on our 2024 movie schedule and counting down the days. 

Check Out The Crazy Borderlands Trailer

If you were expecting to see a trailer that is filled to the brim with intense action, then Borderlands is the one for you. The trailer was released on YouTube and it’s probably one of the craziest ones you’ve ever seen, featuring our first real look at the characters.

The Borderlands Cast

If you’re wondering who is going to star in the Borderlands cast, here is what we know:

Cate Blanchett as Lilith

Cate Blanchett is set to star in the upcoming film, which was announced in May 2020. The actress and Eli Roth made for an unlikely pair when they teamed up for 2018's The House with a Clock in its Walls, and now they are reuniting with this film. She will play Lilith, also known as "The Siren." She's one of only six of her kind, though she's only playable in the original Borderlands. 

Blanchett has appeared in a variety of films, including Carol, Thor: Ragnarok and many others.  

Jack Black as Claptrap

In addition to Cate Blanchett reuniting with her House with a Clock in Its Walls director, Jack Black is also set to collaborate with Eli Roth once more in Borderlands. He'll play arguably the game's most endearing character: Claptrap, the sarcastic robot sidekick.

Black is a comedic actor who has voiced the lead in the Kung Fu Panda franchise, as well as starred in movies like Nacho Libre and School of Rock.  

Kevin Hart as Roland

In the role of Roland is Kevin Hart, who previously worked with Jack Black in Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle and Jumanji: The Next Level. The actor has recently worked on a comedy tour, and appeared in the film Lift. 

Jamie Lee Curtis as Dr. Patricia Tannis

Furthermore, filling in the role of Tannis is none other than Jamie Lee Curtis. Jack Black, Kevin Hart and Jamie Lee Curtis were all announced in early 2021, and the casting announcements kept coming. 

Curtis won an Academy Award for her role in Everything Everywhere All At Once, and is known to be a certified scream queen from the Halloween franchise. She appeared in Haunted Mansion in 2023. 

Ariana Greenblatt as Tiny Tina

The Hollywood Reporter announced in March 2021 that Ariana Greenblatt signed on to the movie to play Tiny Tina, another notable character from the game series, and who received her own spin-off game in 2022. 

The actress even posted a picture of her character on the poster for her fans to see on Instagram in February 2024, showing her excitement: 

Greenblatt was seen most recently in Ahsoka and as part of the Barbie cast. She spoke about working on the film in March 2023 to Screenrant, saying that fans of the franchise could expect “a lot of laughs” and that it’s so much fun:

Seeing as how Tiny Tina was even given a spinoff game, you know her character is essential to the movie. 

Florian Munteanu as Krieg

Also announced by The Hollywood Reporter in mid-March 2021 was that Florian Munteanu signed on to the film, where he will play Krieg, the protector of Tiny Tina. 

The actor has appeared in Creed II, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and more.  

Edgar Ramirez as Atlas

In April 2021, it was reported by Deadline that Edgar Ramirez is going to play Atlas. 

The actor has appeared in The Bourne Ultimatum, Zero Dark Thirty, Hands of Stone and more. 

Gina Gershon as Mad Moxxi

Deadline reported in late April 2021 that Gina Gershon had signed on to play Mad Moxxi in the Borderlands movie, a known character to many fans of the game. She’s appeared in movies such as Face/Off, House of Versace, The Insider, Red Heat, and more. 

Additional Cast Members For Borderlands

According to Deadline in mid-March 2021, Haley Bennett (Cyrano) is also set to star in the film, where she will play a new role that is apparently connected to Lilith’s past.

Announced by IGN in early-April 2021 was Krom’s casting, who will be played by Olivier Richters, a Dutch bodybuilder. Janina Gavankar (The L Word) was also cast in the film, according to Deadline in mid-April 2021, and will play Commander Knoxx. That Deadline article regarding Gershon also noted that Cheyenne Jackson (American Horror Story) signed on to the film in late-April 2021, and will play Jakobs. 

The same Deadline article revealed casting details for Hammerlock, Marcus, Scooter and Ellie. They will be played by Charles Babalola (Black Mirror), Benjamin Byron Davis (Fright Krewe), Steven Boyer (Love Life) and Ryann Redmond (A Good Person). Also, Bobby Lee (Magnum P.I.) will play Larry, a new role. 

Talk about an intense cast list, but I have a feeling this ensemble is about to blow the minds of every person watching.  

The Film Will Follow Several Well-Known Characters On A Quest To Find A Missing Girl

Notably, Eli Roth's Borderlands will focus on Lilith, who was typically a secondary character, rather than the other assorted personalities we follow throughout the Gearbox Software game series. Even so, the character was a big fan-favorite, so having her be center-stage isn’t that surprising. 

As for the story, Borderlands is going to follow Lilith when she returns to her home planet in order to find the missing daughter of a powerful leader. In order to do so, she forms a team of unlikely allies to go on a journey that takes them across the universe, fighting aliens and bad guys, all to find this one girl who could end up changing their lives forever. 

An executive producer for the film, Randy Pitchford, actually spoke with IGN in February 2024 when asked about the official story revealed in the trailer and how the vibes were very similar to that of Guardians of the Galaxy. Pitchford actually revealed that the film was being worked on at the same time as this one, which is why they might feel similar and that there was “mutual influence:” 

Either way, I’ll still be sitting down to watch this movie because it sounds like a heck of a fun time. 

Eli Roth Directed The Film

It’s confirmed that Eli Roth directed the Borderlands film. Roth has made a lot of noise with some of his movies, such as 2013's The Green Inferno, as well as Knock Knock, Death Wish, The House with a Clock in Its Walls, and more, but Borderlands will be a major movie with its ensemble cast.

This will unquestionably be one of his biggest movies yet — if not his biggest. 

Craig Mazin Was Credited As A Writer, But Has Been Replaced By “Joe Crombie”

Okay, so this is where things are a little tricky. For a long time, Craig Mazin, known for creating Chernobyl on HBO as well as the 2023 hit, The Last of Us, was credited as a writer on Borderlands. It was announced back in February 2020, according to Deadline, and still on the press site by about mid-way through 2023 that he is credited as a writer. 

However, in July 2023, according to World of Reel, Mazin’s name was taken off the project, and replaced by the name “Joe Crombie.” The article stated that it was a pseudonym, but Variety reported that same month that Mazin denied this, saying that he is “not a credited writer” on the film whatsoever and that the pseudonym is not his:

Yes, I am just as confused as you are. It’s obvious that the Borderlands movie finished filming, so someone must have written the movie. Mazin’s name is also removed from the directory of the film for the Writer’s Guild of America, again replaced by Joe Crombie. 

Another thing to point out is that on the official Borderlands website, Crombie also shows up in the credits, alongside Eli Roth’s name as the screenwriters who really know what’s going on, but maybe we’ll have this be cleared up as the movie comes closer. 

The Movie Does Not Have An Official MPA Rating Yet

As of March 2024 , there is no official word on what the MPA rating is going to be on Borderlands, but there have been rumors that it could be R. 

With its intense violence, crass humor, dystopian themes, and strong language, among other adult content, Borderlands, the video game, most assuredly earns its M rating. In 2016, according to The Hollywood Reporter, the plan was to make a hard-R movie based on the popular video game series. 

This news did come out before Roth entered the director’s chair, but he’s made several movies that have all carried an R rating. With the noted exception of The House with a Clock in its Walls, every movie that Eli Roth has directed has been R-rated. Thus, it wouldn't be shocking if Borderlands was only intended for adult audiences. 

Again, nothing is confirmed, but it is something to think about. 

What are you the most excited for when it comes to Borderlands? There are so many other great video game adaptations out there, and hopefully, this one ends up joining that list. 

It was back in 2015 when we first heard that Lionsgate was teaming with Gearbox Software and Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. to bring the video game series Borderlands to the big screen with a feature film adaptation. Since then, the popular video game franchise has seen a new entry with last fall’s Borderlands 3, but not much movement on the movie front. That may be about to change though, because it looks like Eli Roth will direct the Borderlands movie. Take a look:

This tweet comes to us from Randy Pitchford, who is the CEO of Gearbox Software, the developer behind the successful Borderlands video game franchise that began back in 2009. Randy took to Twitter to announce that director Eli Roth, whose work includes Cabin Fever, Hostel, Knock Knock and most recently The House with a Clock in its Walls, has come aboard to direct the Borderlands movie for Lionsgate and Arad Productions.

This news has now been confirmed by multiple trades, so it seems official. Not only is the Borderlands movie on its way, but it will be directed by none other than Eli Roth. Producing the film are Ari and Avi Arad for Arad Productions, and Erik Feig via Picturestart. Randy Pitchford will serve as executive producer alongside Strauss Zelnick, the CEO of Take-Two Interactive.

According to THR, Eli Roth will direct Borderlands based on the most recent draft of the script written by Craig Mazin. Mazin’s previous work includes The Hangover Part III and The Huntsman: Winter’s War. Recently, he also created the HBO miniseries Chernobyl, for which he nabbed two Emmys, including one for writing. That hopefully bodes well for the Borderlands script.

In a statement, Eli Roth expressed his confidence in the script and excitement at taking on a project that has such scale and ambition as Borderlands. Lionsgage Motion Picture Group president Nathan Kahane also said that they cracked the code on bringing the property to the big screen, so hopefully this team can deliver a truly great video game movie.

There will certainly be a ton of interest in this project. The Borderlands video game series has sold over 57 million units worldwide since 2009. The most recent entry in the series, Borderlands 3, released last September. Borderlands is a role-playing, first person shooter game that is set on the world of Pandora, but you won’t find any Na’vi on this Pandora.

Similar to James Cameron’s Pandora, the Pandora of Borderlands attracted the attention of mega-corporations seeking fortunes from the planet’s mineral wealth. That turned out to be for naught though, and they don’t find much other than some alien artifacts and dangerous indigenous lifeforms. So the corporations abandoned the planet, leaving behind their workers. The games pick up after this, as it seems that Pandora is not as devoid of wealth as it initially seemed.

It’s certainly a fascinating premise, and given the popularity of the video game franchise, there is clearly something about it that clicks with people. With any luck, that will translate into live-action for the big screen movie. Borderlands is also coming about at what may be an opportune time, Sonic the Hedgehog just broke the opening weekend record for a video game movie following last year’s Detective Pikachu doing the same. Two movies may not be a trend, but perhaps things are on the upswing for the video game movie genre.

According to Variety, production will begin on Borderlands later this year. We’ll keep you updated on this film as news develops. To see what’s coming out this year, check out our 2020 Release Schedule.

With the 1980s nostalgia wave in full force, family friendly adventure movies brought to life by Steven Spielberg and his Amblin Entertainment brand are one of the flavors that filmmakers are imitating in order to ride the craze to its foregone conclusion. The House With A Clock In Its Walls is the latest to try its hand at success, and the fact that Amblin is behind its production definitely gives it a boost when it comes to earning genre credibility. However, director Eli Roth has perhaps delivered his greatest shock to Hollywood audiences with this film, as he fully understands and replicates the feeling of the Amblin canon with total conviction, and zero pretension.

After the death of his parents, Lewis Barnavelt (Owen Vaccaro) is sent to live with his eccentric uncle Jonathan (Jack Black) and his neighbor, Mrs. Zimmerman (Cate Blanchett). Those eccentricities turn out to be rather handy, as Jonathan is actually a Warlock, and Lewis is just the type of kid to dig that sort of thing. What begins as a bit of family bonding also starts unfolding a mystery lost to time, with not very much of it remaining before something evil starts to rear its head.

Despite the zany, madcap film The House With A Clock In Its Walls may pretend to be selling, the movie actually takes time to build its world and characters the right way. Writer Eric Kripke, in adapting the children's book by John Bellairs, captures all of the elements essential to the film's story, and doesn't take the shortcuts some kids' films might in order to favor spectacle. While this may throw some moviegoers off, as the madcap pacing the trailers suggest is absent from a good portion of the film, the story structure pays off. By time the fast-paced adventure content kicks in later in The House With A Clock In Its Walls' course of events, there are actual stakes at play, and characters to root for.

It also cannot be overstated how The House With A Clock In Its Walls has a fantastic cast that brings said material to life. In particular, Jack Black and Cate Blanchett's chemistry as a pair of bickering, but extremely friendly, neighbors sparkles throughout the film. Though it's Blanchett's Mrs. Zimmerman who threatens to steal the show every time she's on screen, as her comedic timing and dramatic gravitas anchors a lot of the film's emotional weight. Black, on the other hand, nails the whimsy of Jonathan's world, and keeps the comedic gears moving. Some of his gags will work better on the kids, but the adults will have something to laugh at as well. Together, with burgeoning talent Owen Vaccaro as the young protagonist Lewis, this band of misfits is quite entertaining, and effective.

As this is a family movie, The House With A Clock In Its Walls is indeed safe for your young ones to watch, although the older they are, the more they'll get out of the film's balance of kid approved comedy and the more mature moments of the film's spookier side. That said, the more intriguing the film gets, the darker pieces of its narrative seem to be shaded. As the mystery behind that titular clock unfolded, I found myself getting drawn deeper into The House With A Clock In The Walls' charms. While I knew some of the steps ahead of when they played out in the story, I still found myself enjoying those moves nonetheless. By time the action kicked in during the film's finale, I was glued to the film and loving every moment.

It's been an interesting year for Eli Roth, with Death Wish coming and going, despite it being more his stereotypical speed. In the tradition of directors like Martin Scorsese and Danny Boyle, Roth's transition to the ins and outs of a family picture happened without missing a step, delivering a true blue Amblin branded romp that is as fun as it is colorful. The House With A Clock In Its Walls is an absolute blast of fun and whimsy, ready to take families on an adventure that the may be familiar with, but will nevertheless still smile to see returning to theaters, and not a minute too soon.

Eli Roth's The House With A Clock In Its Walls very much feels like a throwback. On beyond being a period story based on a classic novel from the early 1970s, kid-friendly horror is a tradition that we simply don't see celebrated as often as we used to on the big screen. Really it's a high-stakes live-action adventure in the vein of some of the greatest hits of the 1980s, and as I recently learned from screenwriter Eric Kripke, many of those key titles were in the back of mind during the making of the film:

There certainly has been an uptick in recent years when it comes to sensitivity in regards to parents, their kids, and the movies they watch -- and according to Eric Kripke The House With A Clock In Its Walls is a chance for moms and dads everywhere to perhaps ease up a touch. While that may seem like a big proposition, during an interview earlier this week he pointed to a number of modern classics that were both kid-oriented but not without an important level of maturity. Amblin titles like Gremlins and Goonies didn't pull its punches and weren't afraid to challenge or scare younger audiences a bit, and that's a vibe the new film is hoping to capture.

While the highlighted 1980s titles were vital in crafting the tone for The House With A Clock In Its Walls, in a separate interview with Eli Roth the filmmaker also told me about two other films that were influential in his approach: Spider-Man and The Lord Of The Rings. Specifically, those were two family-friendly blockbuster titles helmed by directors who had their roots in indie horror, and he kept those journeys in mind as he was making a similar venture:

The House With A Clock In Its Walls is certainly a long, long way away from the horrors of titles like Cabin Fever and Hostel, but it's also a film that ultimately still shows the same kind of appreciation and passion for genre. It's a very different color for Eli Roth, but you can still recognize texture and shading.

Those curious to see the finished work will have their chance to do so very soon, as The House With A Clock In Its Walls -- starring Jack Black, Cate Blanchett, and Kyle McLaughlin -- arrives in theaters this Friday. Tickets are on sale now, and be sure to keep your eyes peeled on CinemaBlend for more from my interviews with Eli Roth and Eric Kripke.

Steven Spielberg is not only one of the greatest filmmakers of all time, but also just so happens to be one of the best family filmmakers of all time. He's made plenty of movies solely for adults, but his resume as both a director and a producer also includes a particularly wonderful collection of titles geared towards younger audiences. As a result, when he is offering advice on an upcoming project others tend to pay attention -- and when it came specifically to the making of the new movie The House With A Clock In Its Walls he had one key tip: don't be afraid to let it be legitimately scary. Screenwriter Eric Kripke recently told me,

Steven Spielberg has more than a few films for young audiences on his resume sporting some legitimate scares, including Poltergeist, The Goonies, and Raiders of The Lost Ark, and it was likely with those titles in mind that he helped director Eli Roth find the proper tone to strike with The House With A Clock In Its Walls. Spielberg isn't a producer on the new movie, but his company, Amblin Entertainment, is behind it, and it allowed for Spielberg to offer some consultancy on the project -- specifically that it shouldn't shy away from the horror genre.

To the credit of Eli Roth and Eric Kripke, they definitely followed Steven Spielberg's advice, as there are more than a few real scares in the new film including creepy automatons, possessed jack o lanterns, and even living topiary griffin. It's not stuff that will necessarily cause weeks of nightmares, but The House With A Clock In Its Walls definitely aims to make you jump in certain moments, and that can certainly be thrilling and memorable for a younger crowd that can feel more adult while watching it -- almost like a test of maturity. Many adults can point to experiences watching similar movies growing up, and now the tradition is continuing.

Based on the book by John Bellairs, The House With A Clock In Its Walls centers on a young boy named Lewis Barnavelt (Owen Vaccaro), an introverted bookworm who moves in with his oddball Uncle Jonathan (Jack Black) following the death of his parents. He quickly discovers that things are not quite normal in his new residence, and it's because his mother's brother is actually a warlock who has an on-going confrontation with evil forces. With the help of their strange and witty neighbor Mrs. Zimmerman (Cate Blanchett), they aim to solve a mystery that has been haunting the home with a loud and persistent tick-tocking, and it's an adventure that proves to be more and more dangerous as it continues.

It's a fun ride, and audiences will be able to experience it for themselves soon, with The House With A Clock In Its Walls arriving in theaters this Friday, September 21st.

It's no secret that reboots and revivals are everywhere. With nostalgia ruling the day in entertainment, just about any property from our past is up for grabs. The most recent of these is Eli Roth's new action flick Death Wish, starring the always badass Bruce Willis. This is the second film adaptation of the novel of the same name, the first of which hit theaters back in 1974. Casual contemporary moviegoers might not be overly familiar with the original Death Wish, allowing Roth to introduce the property for the first time for many. He did just that, although it'll likely go down as the worst version of the Brian Garfield novel.

The story opens up with the seemingly perfect Kersey family, who live in the suburbs of Chicago. Bruce Willis' protagonist Paul lives his happy surgeon life with wife Lucy (Elisabeth Shue), and their endlessly perky high school grad Jordan (newcomer Camila Morrone). Paul's brother Frank (Vincent D'Onofrio) is also super involved in the family, although he sometimes has to borrow money from his brother. All is going well before the family is targeted for a robbery, seemingly at random.

Instead of robbing an empty house, both Lucy and Jordan are home during the invasion. While this should be an incident moviegoers are dreading, it's a welcomed change from the bubble-gum-cheesy world we were shown as Death Wish got through its first act exposition. After struggling with their masked assailants, Lucy is killed, and Jordan ends up in a coma. This puts both actresses out of the film for the majority of its runtime, while also ending the cliched dialogue that writers Joe Carnahan, Eli Roth, and Dean Georgaris assembled during the movie's first scenes.

Things escalate fairly quickly from there, with Paul going out into the hard Chicago streets looking for trouble with a stolen gun. His first foray into vigilante justice is one of the more thrilling scenes from the film, as he roughly stumbles through stopping an armed robbery. The whole incident is caught on someone's iPhone, and Paul (whose face wasn't seen) quickly goes viral. This choice is Death Wish's attempt at modernizing the story, alongside some signature Eli Roth moments of horror.

Once Death Wish settles into its action heavy thrill ride, there are certainly spots of sporadic movie magic. The violence is shocking and quick, and Eli Roth's creative way of killing off the bad guys will remind horror fans why he became such a smash with the Hostel franchise and other horror movies. The man knows how to make gore work, and he selectively uses it in Death Wish in some effective sequences.

Unfortunately, the timing of Death Wish's release feels somewhat inappropriate, which will no doubt affect its critical and box office performance. Following the massacre at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, the subject of gun violence and control are almost constant in the news cycle. It's a sensitive subject for those on both sides of the aisle, so the overall themes of Death Wish are going to strike a chord. The mention of an AR-15 accompanied a moment of panic for me, and not in a way that director/writer Eli Roth was intending. Due to the news cycle and state of affairs in the country, it's unclear if folks will be willing to watch a guy go vigilante and shoot up criminals, even if it's Bruce Willis.

Bruce Willis is no doubt the biggest draw of Death Wish, as he's one of the industry's quintessential action stars. Still. And while it's fantastic to watch John McClane pop some bad guys, his performance in more still moments feels a bit stiff. He dutifully sheds a single tear during emotional scenes, and appears a bit uncomfortable when playing opposite Elisabeth Shue. Vincent D'Onofrio is the real standout of the film, reminding us why he's been working so much in the past few years. Model Camila Morrone makes her film debut as Paul's daughter Jordan, and spends the majority of her scenes cuddling up on her scene partner. Breaking Bad fans will also be psyched to see Dean Norris playing a Schrader-esque Detective Rains.

While Death Wish is surely problematic given the current climate, the pacing is solid, and the overall runtime sits at a tight 107 minutes. For those able to enjoy the subject matter, it'll no doubt be a fun weekend movie. But for more regular moviegoers and cinephiles, it can be a cringeworthy romp that has an occasional peak to its set of valleys.

Remakes, in general, are frowned upon. Why attempt to improve on a classic, beloved film when an original works so well in the first place? And yet, occasionally, we land on a remake that attracts the right talents, and arrives at a time where the message speaks loudly to a contemporary society. I think that's what's happening with Death Wish, an Eli Roth film that stars Bruce Willis and just dropped its first trailer. And it doesn't suck:

The concept of Death Wish -- which first starred the late Charles Bronson in a series of vengeance thrillers in the 1970s and '80s -- is relatively simple. A man loses his loved ones to street-level thugs, then wages his own war on crime as a well-armed vigilante. Comic fans will recognize it as the story of The Punisher. Really, it's not wildly original, but it satisfies audiences on a primal level.

Is this all a little on the nose? Yes. The use of AC/DC's Back in Black is, always, too cliché for a trailer. And Bruce Willis has made a career of playing blue-collar dudes who are fed up with the ways of evil men, who steps up to the plate to clean up proverbial messes, usually with his fists. And guns. Lots of guns. When he puts his hoodie up, it actually looks like this is the sequel to Unbreakable that we never got. Which we will get soon (thanks to M. Night Shyamalan). But which won't be attached to this Death Wish remake. Confused yet?

Giving Death Wish over to director Eli Roth is intriguing. The filmmaker has been known for some torturous horror exercises -- and by that, I mean that he's not afraid to torture characters on screen in an effort to make his audience squirm, in the best ways possible. You need a strong stomach to survive an Eli Roth joint, and some of the kills hinted at in this Death Wish trailer look like they could push several envelopes of what's allowed in an R-rated movie.

Want to hear the funny part? MGM is releasing Death Wish on November 22 of this year. Just in time for Thanksgiving. That sounds like clever counterprogramming to the family drama Wonder, or the world-saving antics of DC's Justice League movie. But how many families are going to push back from the table on Thanksgiving evening and decide to digest their turkey with a bone-crunching screening of a new Death Wish movie? Come to think of it, that's a clan I want to hang out with.

We'll bring you more on Bruce Willis and Eli Roth's Death Wish as we get closer to the release date. And head over here for a complete rundown of all 2017 movies reaching theaters.

Jim Carrey has made a name for himself over two decades as one of Hollywood's funniest actors, but in several instances, he brought those comedic chops onto comic book-related projects. In 1995, he played The Riddler in Batman Forever, and 18 years later, he played Colonel Stars and Stripes in Kick-Ass 2 (though he later spoke out against that movie). Now there's word that Carrey will add a third comic book movie to his resume: Aleister Arcane, based on the IDW series, which has the potential to be way more violent than Kick-Ass 2.

Jim Carrey will team up with horror director Eli Roth on Aleister Arcane (originally written by Steve Niles and illustrated by Breehn Burns), according to THR. The Woman in Black 2: Angel of Death writer Jon Croker will pen the script, while David Hoberman, Todd Lieberman (both from Mandeville Films) and Michael Aguilar will produce. In addition to starring as the eponymous character, Carrey will also executive produce.

Originally published over three issues in 2004, Aleister Arcane was about Aleister Green, a late night TV show host who adopted the "Arcane" identity for his midnight horror series in Jackson, Oklahoma. Aleister enjoyed the sketches he got to perform on the air, but after the network grew disgusted at the show's gore, he was fired. An incident involving two children eventually led to him being put on trial and succumbing to an early grave, but before dying, he left a "gift" behind that lead to horrific events occurring all over town. Now it's up to those two children to break the curse that Alesiter conjured. As you would guess, it's a job easier said than done.

In addition to being his third comic book movie, Aleister Arcane will also be Jim Carrey's second horror movie, following 2017's The Bad Batch. He previously starred in The Number 23, but that's more of a psychological thriller. Carrey has also starred in a scattering of drama movies over the years, so it's not like he's a stranger to the more dramatic fare. However, judging by Aleister Green's personality in the graphic novel, it sounds like there will be room for Carrey to be his usual weird and humorous self in the midst of the movie's freaky moments. In addition to Aleister Arcane and The Bad Batch, Carrey also has the crime film True Crimes coming out, so the man who's noted for his wacky hijinks on the big screen is clearly eager to get more serious with his roles, literally.

Aleister Arcane hasn't been assigned a release date yet, but we'll keep you updated on its progress as more information comes in.

After a long period of silence, it appears things are beginning to move on the planned remake of Death Wish starring Bruce Willis. Now, we know the project is still alive, and might possibly begin to move forward again, as it has a new director. In an interesting move, horror director Eli Roth has been chosen to helm the film. While that might imply the film is looking to go in a particular direction, the rest of the details imply that _Death Wish _ is not looking to become a gore fest.

Following the confirmation a few months ago that Bruce Willis was on board to star in the remake of the Charles Bronson vigilante movie Death Wish comes news that the previously announced directors, Aharon Keshales and Navot Papushado, have left the film, and have been replaced by Eli Roth. According to Deadline, the two wanted to make changes to the current version of the script. However, Bruce Willis had already signed off on the existing version, and whatever changes the directors wanted to make, the studio wasn't interested in. This led to the director's chair being left vacant, and Eli Roth just picked it up.

The word is that MGM & Paramount, the studios in charge, are looking at Death Wish as a potential new franchise, because of course they are. Eli Roth is best known for extreme horror titles, like the Hostel series. This would make Death Wish a huge opportunity for the director to break into more mainstream filmmaking. One assumes that he's happy with the script as is, since the studio won't want to go through the same thing over again.

Death Wish has been a project in development for quite some time, but "creative differences" have been an issue long before today. Joe Carnahan wrote the first version of the remake script, and was attached to direct the film as well, but he left following his own differences with the studio. Reportedly, those differences included the casting of Bruce Willis in the lead role. Apparently he was against it. Of course, since Willis was only officially attached three months ago, and Carnahan left three years ago, quite a lot has happened since then. The film saw at least one other director, and a few more drafts of the script in that time. Scott Alexander & Larry Karaszewski are responsible for the current version. What do you think? Is Eli Roth the right person to helm Death Wish?

Hollywood is a world of remakes at the moment. Audiences are eager to feel the nostalgia they did watching movies of yore. Now it seems that his trend of reboots has extended into the world of horror films, as Eli Roth’s 2002 thriller Cabin Fever is getting a reboot as well. A trailer was just released for the upcoming nightmare-inducing film, and while it does look pretty scary we can’t help but notice something strange. Check it out.

So, this looks like literally the exact same movie. All of it. Every plot point. I suppose die hard fans of the original might be excited, but it does seem strange that the new one looks essentially identical to the 2002 version. Although it is thoroughly lacking in Shawn Hunter from Boy Meets World.

The plot of both films is as follows: a group of college students rent a cabin in the woods to celebrate their spring break from matriculation. Drinks are had, flirting is done, and most importantly: there is a creepy hermit who has been infected with a disease that claimed his dog. The disease is a flesh-eating horror show, and the twenty-somethings slowly catch and fall victim to the truly gross, you guessed it, cabin fever.

The trailer for the new Cabin Fever reveals probably too much information and footage of what will happen in the film. While that is a problem within itself, it also shows just how similar to the original it is. Seriously, it’s almost shot for shot.

For one, the pretty blonde girl is the first to get sick and they put her in a barn as quarantine. Sound familiar? In fact, this discovery is once again made when she’s in the heat of passion and the flesh eating virus manifests itself on her inner thigh. Additionally, there also seems to be the gory scene where the friends accidentally light an infected man on fire when trying to keep him away from the cabin. Plus, there are townspeople chasing an infected teen, and the brunette girl discovering her infection while trying to shave her legs in the bathtub. Literally all of these scenes were in the original.

The only aspect of the new Cabin Fever that seems to be different is the focus on the nearby town itself. While the 2002 version certainly had a bit of this, there’s a ton of footage in the trailer that has civilians both good and bad taking part in the chaos that ensues. Plus the new police officer character is a gorgeous modelesque woman, rather than a male that likes to party.

Cabin Fever will be released in theaters on February 12th, 2016.

Many crazy things happened to Eli Roth and the cast and crew of The Green Inferno. The horror filmmaker would only see actors who agreed to get yellow fever vaccinations and trek deep into a tarantula, snake, poisonous frog-infested Amazonian jungle. In short, no divas. But the craziest thing to happen to Roth’s film involved receiving a baby as a gift. 

To promote The Green Inferno, Roth went on Reddit for an AMA session. One user cited his unique casting prerequisites and asked for more crazy stories. Roth replied with a doozy. He said:

To give you more context, Roth took his crew to Peru and got a real Peruvian village to be in The Green Inferno. This village never saw a movie before Roth’s producers showed them Cannibal Holocaust using a TV, generator, and DVD player. According to Roth, the people thought it was a comedy, and after that everyone agreed to be in the film.

The story of The Green Inferno centers on a group of college students turned activists. After Justine (Lorenza Izzo) meets Alejandro (Ariel Levy), who’s been on a hunger strike on behalf of underpaid janitors, she decides to help him with his initiative to save the Amazon. After their plane crashes in the jungle, however, their group is taken captive by a tribe of hungry cannibals. 

Not to diminish the impact of this film or anything, but it’s eerily reminiscent of that South Park episode, “Rainforest Shmainforest,” in which the kids and their school group go to Costa Rica and try to save the rainforest before a trip through the cannibal-filled forest has them (literally) singing a different tune. 

Not saying, either, that Roth jacked this idea, but…South Park already did it. Though, Cannibal Holocaust did it before any of them.

The Green Inferno stars Lorenza Izzo, Ariel Levy, Aaron Burns, Kirby Bliss Blanton, Sky Ferreira, Daryl Sabara, Magda Apanowicz, and Nicolas Martinez. The film hits theaters this Friday, September 25. 

Horror movies have a long history as sexual cautionary tales. The teens that have sex are always the first ones to die in slasher films, It Follows showed us that you can catch something way scarier than an STD, and in this new trailer for Eli Roth’s Knock Knock, Keanu Reeves learns the hard way that he really should have kept it in his pants.

This latest trailer shows off more of the set up of Knock Knock than the last, making clear exactly what the stakes are for the protagonist. Portrayed by The Matrix star, Evan Webber is an architect and a family man, home alone who learns a couple of very valuable lessons you can glean from horror as a genre.

First, never open the door at night, especially if it’s raining. Nothing good will come from that. Even if you think you’re doing a good deed, like helping stranded motorists, you’re totally screwed. No good deed, I guess. The second, which we’ve already alluded to, never, ever have sex with anyone, especially strangers. Really, when you think about it, horror, as a whole, is telling you to never have sex and never help anyone.

But poor Evan Webber, he learns these lessons the hard way when two beautiful young women (Lorenza Izzo and Ana de Armas) knock on his door in the middle of the night, soaking wet, and looking to have a little fun. And their version of fun is a wee bit different from most of ours, at least I hope, as it involves seducing Keanu Reeves, then just torturing and tormenting the living hell out of him. Granted, he has some comeuppance on the way for cheating on his wife, but tying him up, beating him, maybe burying him alive, and chasing him around his own house with a shotgun may be a bit overboard.

Knock Knock is one of two directorial efforts that Eli Roth (Hostel) has hitting theaters this fall. The first is his take on the 1970s cannibal exploitation subgenre, The Green Inferno, which finds a bunch of do-gooders held captive in the Amazon by a tribe of people who, very simply, want to eat them. After making its debut at the 2013 Toronto International Film Festival, it was originally slated to hit theaters in September of last year, but it was shelved last minute and will come out on this September 25 instead.

Just a few weeks later, we get Knock Knock, the horror favorite’s take on the home invasion subgenre. Another festival film, it premiered at Sundance earlier this year, but will make its way to theaters in a much timelier manner, launching on October 9.

What do you think of this trailer? Does Keanu get what’s coming to him?

Horror director Eli Roth’s latest movie, The Green Inferno, may be a genre throwback to exploitation fare like Cannibal Holocaust, Cannibal Ferox, and really any movie with the word cannibal in the title, but he has another agenda as well. He wants to point out the hypocrisy of people who express outrage about the state of the world on social media but who refuse to do anything beyond tweet.

Talking to Hero Complex at San Diego Comic-Con recently, Roth discussed what he calls Social Justice Warriors, and how people see something on Facebook or Twitter and, though their hearts may be in the right place, go overboard with their reaction to something they just found out about, spouting off about situations they don’t even necessarily understand. The inspiration for The Green Inferno sprang from this. He said:

Roth’s film takes an ironic twist because these kids in question actually manage to do some good. In this case, a bunch of city kids go to the Amazon jungle in order to help save an endangered indigenous tribe, and are successful in their endeavor. Things take a turn for the worse, however, when, flying home, their plane crashes in the middle of the jungle and they encounter the very people they saved, who, as you may have inferred, turn out to be cannibals.

It’s funny that Roth decries people not doing anything real, but his movie is about people who actually do something and are eaten for their troubles. From what he says, he mostly questions the motivations of people on the internet who just retweet every post about every new cause. He wonders if they’re sincere or just want to come across as good, caring people in a public forum, and The Green Inferno is, at least in part, his reaction to this phenomenon.

When The Green Inferno finally hits theaters on September 25, it will have taken a circuitous route. It debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2013 and hit a few more fests on the way to what was supposed to be a September, 2014 release, but it was shelved shortly before the unveiling. But now Blumhouse Tilt, a new multi-platform arm of low-budget horror factory Blumhouse Productions, is finally set to unleash the film on the unsuspecting, or at least partially suspecting, public.

It appears that the Cretaceous killer success of Jurassic World may have provided enough momentum to get a long-idle project about a gigantic prehistoric throwback of a shark to shallow waters. It is being reported that a film based on the bestselling novel, Meg is moving forward with none other than horror master, Eli Roth circling to take the helm.

According to a report from Variety, Warner Bros. is moving forward with a potential tentpole project in Meg, based on the 1997 series-spawning novel of the same name by Steve Alten. Residing in developmental purgatory for nearly two decades, the giant shark film will now look to move forward with the Hostel series and Cabin Fever mastermind, Eli Roth currently in talks to direct.

The atmosphere for such a project is ever-ripe with Jurassic World, which also showcased its own memorable sea monstrosity. Warner Bros. has been reportedly enthusiastic about the Meg script by Dean Georgaris, who wrote Lara Croft: Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life and the reboot of The Manchurian Candidate. However, with Jurassic World’s $208.8 million opening weekend becoming nearly as awe-inspiring as the dinosaurs it showcased, there can be little doubt that efforts were expedited. Yet, the potential recruitment of Eli Roth to the director’s chair points to a darker direction than the Jurassic films; possibly indicating that we could be looking at a completely new take on the "giant creatures swallowing people whole" genre from the cinematic auteur of torture.

Alten’s Meg book series follows a protagonist in a former U.S. Navy submersible pilot with a paleontology Ph.D. named Jonas Taylor who’s looking to prove that a horrible encounter years earlier with an ancient species of shark was, indeed, not just the worst big fish story ever. His obsession leads him seven miles down the Mariana Trench to pursue the titular terror, the Carcharadon Megalodon; a prehistoric 60 foot, 70,000 pound Great White Shark with 7 inch long serrated teeth attached to jaws that open wide enough to swallow six grown men in one bite. What happens from there is full of dreadful, deep sea torment filled with human-chummed waters and over-the-top twists and turns. Watch this trailer below for a recent anniversary edition of the book to get a better feel for the property.

While detractors of Alten’s Meg novels have criticized their superficiality and loose research, fans have found the mix between fact and fiction workable enough to enjoy the novels for their element of pure excitement. It will certainly be interesting to see exactly how Meg can translate to the big screen; especially given its possible creative captain in Roth. If the film is, indeed, capitalizing on Jurassic momentum, then the brooding claustrophobic scarlet-soaked calamity of R-rated revulsion one might mentally evoke with the name, "Eli Roth" might just render such momentum moot. Thus, we might be witnessing Roth turning over a new mainstream leaf.

While nothing as far as production or release dates have been set for Meg, you can catch Eli Roth’s upcoming latest work starring Keanu Reeves as a femme fatale-plagued family man in Knock Knock, which will see its wide release sometime later this year.

Keanu Reeves is the one who knocks. Come on, you knew that one was coming. Unfortunately, for John Wick, doing so doesn’t elevate him to Heisenberg status. The new Knock Knock trailer has arrived to preview a creep-tastic girls-gone-wild movie. Instead of women with low self-esteem taking their tops off for the camera, this bff duo uses wild in the psychopathic sense.

Reeves plays a family man named Evan Webber in Knock Knock. He’s happily married to a wife, with whom he has a daughter. One day when he’s home alone, two young women show up on his doorstep soaked from the torrential downpour outside. They have some car trouble and their only cellphone is wet. Evan welcomes them into his home to use the phone, dry off their clothes and shower. And what better way to thank the man who rescued them from the col than having a crazy threesome? Of course, like most men in horror films, sex doesn’t lead to good times. The girls return soon after to torture him in his own home, and as it turns out, they’ve done this to a number of men before and none have survived.

This looks like another spine-tingling tale from horror maven Eli Roth. As if he wasn’t satisfied with torturing his audiences through the cannibal thriller The Green Inferno, the hard-to-watch Hostel movies or his Netflix original series Hemlock Grove, he has to bring in two crazy-faced killers who put the "fatal" in femme fatale. Taking these roles are Lorenza Izzo and Ana De Armas. Izzo has been featured in a number of Roth’s projects, including the previously mentioned and Aftershock. De Armas, on the otherhand, is more unknown to mainstream audiences, though she has a slew of Spanish-language titles to her name.

The broken down car, the rainy night, the unexpected houseguests, the family man who gives into temptation, and the secretly insane female character (or characters) who wreak havoc are all, unfortunately, cliches of the horror genre. It’s hard to judge a book by its cover — in this case the Knock Knock trailer. But being that it is Roth at the helm and Reeves in the lead role, after coming off of an incredible performance in John Wick, we still have high hopes for this film.

Knock Knock debuted at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year. Though it doesn’t currently have a U.S. release date, it’s set to premiere in the U.K. on June 26, with other international releases following in the months ahead. We can likely expect a domestic theatrical debut to fall within this same time frame.

Having a threesome is the classic male fantasy - but over the years pop culture has shown us the oh-so-many ways that it can wind up being a disaster. It seems that Eli Roth's new film Knock Knock is yet another example of one of these ways, but rather than being a drama about hurt feelings, it appears this one is a strange up horror show. Watch the debut trailer below:

Post by Eli Roth.

As you can probably tell, this preview debuted over on director Eli Roth's personal Facebook page - and it's honestly a rather strange trailer. After all, it does a solid job of setting up the film's initial action - Evan Webber (Keanu Reeves) is home alone and basically gets seduced into having a threesome with two lovely ladies (Ana de Armas, Lorenza Izzo) - but it doesn't actually demonstrate any of the negative consequences that are going to be on display. Yes, obviously Reeves is doing something morally wrong by cheating on his wife, but what exactly can we expect to see as his horrific punishment? As things stand, all we really have are a few ominous title cards and a stern-looking Reeves walking down a hallway while women giggle in the background.

I am certainly fan of trailers that don't give absolutely everything away, and I hope that this Knock Knock teaser is being specifically vague because there's a secret in the movie that's best left to experience on the big screen - but at the same time this trailer isn't necessarily ominous or interesting enough to make be beg for the answer to that question.

This trailer has been unveiled because of Knock Knock's recent debut at this year's Sundance Film Festival, and at the very least what does make it somewhat interesting is that it appears to be a movie from a much more restrained Eli Roth. The filmmaker is rather notorious for equating gushing blood with scares, but here he looks to be going for more terror than horror. As mentioned, this teaser doesn't really show us much so it's hard to say if things will stay that way, but I am hoping that this is more of a thoughtful, tense home invasion piece instead of another gore-fest.

If you really dug this Knock Knock teaser and want to see the film, the bad news is that we don't have exact details on how you will be able to go about doing that just yet. The movie has not yet picked up distribution, so there currently aren't any release plans. Stay tuned, though, as the announcement of a deal may not be long off.

Warning: The following poster for the Eli Roth-produced horror movie Clown has been banned in Italy. Proceed with caution.

Behold the ghoul at the center of Clown. He's a pretty grisly interpretation of the childhood party mainstay. Instead of brightly colored face paints, his makeup is made up of a mess of scars and blood. He exudes malevolence as the tagline translates to "No child is safe." But is he too scary to be seen in posters? Maybe.

iHorror has called to our attention an Instagram post from the film's producer Eli Roth that shares the above poster with the caption "Banned in Italy! This poster for #Clown."

Roth doesn't comment on the reason for the ban, but iHorror is positing it might be too disturbing for mass consumption. The film's Italian PR team was quick to spin this obstacle into a new angle on their campaign, offering up a new poster that promotes the first one's prohibition. You can see it below:

Also shared by Roth in Instagram, this poster blocks out much of the creepy clown's features, but leaves enough remnants of that gnarled nose and facial scars to remain unnerving. As you might have gathered whether or not you're fluent in Italian, the additional poster text reads, "The image of this poster was censored."

Eli Roth comments on the revised poster, "I think it's even creepier."

Clown began as a movie trailer made by aspiring horror auteur Jon Watts. When Hostel director Eli Roth saw this cheeky bit of calling card, he got on board to help Watts spin his twisted trailer into a full on feature-length film. Watts penned the pic with Christopher D. Ford, and together they crafted a clown story unlike any we've heard before. This is not the tormented performer turned killer from American Horror Story: Freak Show. This is far weirder.

The story centers on a loving father whose forced to scramble for a clown when the one he hired for his son's birthday bails. As fate would have it, he finds a costume and the party is saved! But when it comes time to take off the clown nose and wig, this dear old dad finds he can't get out of them without injury. And something inside of him begins to turn wicked.

Clown opens November 13th in Italy. No U.S. release date has been announced.

To see the full Clown trailer, click to page 2. You have to know... it is beyond disturbing.

Clown - Trailer - Click here for another funny movie.

You may not have noticed unless you're a true horror geek, but in the last decade Eli Roth's Cabin Fever has actually developed into its own franchise. The first sequel, titled Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever, was made back in 2009, and a second, called Cabin Fever: Patient Zero was actually released earlier this year. Rather than moving forward, however, it now seems that the series is taking a step backwards, as it has been announced that the Eli Roth original is getting remade - but with an extra special twist.

Deadline has the news of the developing Cabin Fever remake, including the bizarre news that the new film will be using the exact same script that was used for the original. That's right: instead of taking the original idea and reworking in some kind of interesting way, the remake will instead once again use the screenplay that was co-written by Eli Roth and Randy Pearlstein. As a result of this, the film is moving along incredibly quickly, and there are actually plans to start filming this week in Portland, Oregon. Filmmaker Travis Zariwny is attached to direct the movie, while Roth is attached as an executive producer. It's been announced that Teen Wolf‘s Gage Golightly, Dustin Ingram, Samuel Davis, Matthew Daddario and Nadine Crocker will all be starring in the movie, but it's unclear what roles they will be taking.

For those unfamiliar with the original Cabin Fever, the movie centered on a group of five college grads who decide to take a weekend vacation in a cabin in the woods (a rookie mistake). Rather than the cabin being haunted by ghosts or demons, however, this particular location has been infested with a horrifying flesh-eating virus that slowly chews its way through the cast. Being an Eli Roth-directed feature, the film features a good number of horrific moments and gross out gags - like what you'll find in the clip below (WARNING: Very NSFW)

Originally there was a plan to make Cabin Fever: Patient Zero and a sequel called Cabin Fever: Outbreak as back-to-back prequels to the original Eli Roth movie, but that idea has been scrapped in favor of this new remake. My question is: why? Gus Van Sant's 1998 shot-for-shot remake of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho already proved that there's no water in this well, and I can't honestly figure out why the franchise would move in this direction. Hopefully there will be some kind of twist to it, but I don't have a ton of confidence in that hope.

In non-surprising news, the female-centric network WE is continuing to assert its cable presence by ordering its second scripted series. In eye-bogglingly surprising news, that second scripted series will be a supernatural tale executive produced by two of modern horror’s most recognizable names: director Eli Roth (Hostel) and producer Jason “I’ll turn this $5 million budget into a $100 million bankroll” Blum (The Conjuring). The pair are teaming up for the demonic Southern thriller South of Hell, which was officially given the greenlight for an eight-episode season set to air at some point next year.

Set in Savannah, Georgia, South of Hell will center on 30-year-old Maria Abascal, a beautiful and deadly demon hunter – a description that just doesn’t show up on TV enough – who, with her brother David, is dedicated to destroying the malevolent beings that are taking over the bodies of other Savannah citizens. But Maria isn’t without fault of her own, as she constantly struggles to sate her own demon, named Abigail, who feeds on the evil that Maria draws out of others. It isn’t until Maria tries to rid herself of Abigail that she finds out exactly how dedicated the demon is to staying alive.

An interesting synopsis, surely, especially for WE tv, a network that has spent nearly all of its existence airing schmaltzy romantic comedies and, in recent years, reality series devoted to singer Toni Braxton and model Kendra Wilkinson. It’ll be great to get another show on the air with an ass-kicking woman standing front and center, assuming they choose to go with an established actress instead of just a wildly attractive newcomer who has gotten too old for The CW. My vote is for Parks and Recreation’s Aubrey Plaza.

According to Deadline, Roth will be directing at least the premiere episode of South of Hell, which was written by newcomer Matt Lambert. Rounding out the talent roster is Dexter creator James Manos Jr., who will serve as South of Hell’s showrunner and executive producer.

This is the second TV outing for Eli Roth, whose Netflix series Hemlock Grove is gearing up for Season 2. His long-awaited Hostel 2 follow-up The Green Inferno is hitting theaters on September 5, and he’s already in post-production on his next movie, the Keanu Reeves-starring home invasion thriller Knock Knock.

Jason Blum, who was one of the minds behind ABC’s failed found-footage thriller The River, also has the R.L. Stine novel adaptation Eye Candy coming to MTV, and executive produced Ryan Murphy’s AIDS drama The Normal Heart, which airs this Sunday on HBO. He has no less than 20 productions currently awaiting a future release, including The Purge: Anarchy, Jessabelle, Ouija, Amityville and Jem and the Holograms, to name but a few.

We can expect to see South of Hell airing at some point in 2015, following in what will hopefully be the successful footsteps of WE tv’s first original series, the law thriller The Divide. But I won’t count my demons before they’re hatched.

A few years ago, Netflix entered the original programming realm with gusto and gumption, putting out programs running the gamut from drama to comedy. If there were any questions about the streaming service’s potential around the time Lilyhammer hit the schedule, those questions are long over. Shows like House of Cards and Orange is the New Black have already proved otherwise. This week, Netflix announced the premiere date for the second season of another of its prominent series, Eli Roth’s drama, Hemlock Grove. The service even threw in a brand new teaser to boot.

The teaser doesn’t really explain much about Season 2, but it does give us a finite premiere date. Fans can start powering through new episodes of Hemlock Grove on July 11, which is actually much sooner than you might think. Additionally, a press release from Netflix notes that the series will be available at 12:01 a.m. PT, which means all but the diehard East Coast fans of the series will likely wait until morning to begin catching the new episodes.

The wild supernatural drama starring Famke Jannsen and Bill Skarsgård ended its first season with death, destruction and the end of a few mysteries. However, it left plenty of questions unanswered, setting up Hemlock Grove for a second season. Unfortunately for fans, viewers won’t be getting 13 episodes this time around. Instead, Netflix has signed on for ten episodes of its campy horror thriller, and we even know a little bit about what will be coming in the new episodes, even if the teaser isn’t too forthcoming. Here’s what Netflix has to say about Hemlock Grove’s second season.

While I wouldn’t say Hemlock Grove is necessarily a series you should go out of your way to subscribe to Netflix for, if you already have the streaming service, all thirteen Season 1 episodes are currently available to view before Season 2 airs.

Good day, stranglers of all things neckless. Olympics, huh? Sports on ice are no fun until there’s blood involved. Maybe it’s just me, but I think acting out scenes from John Carpenter’s The Thing should be a winter event.

Ridley Scott’s Alien turns 35 this year, and few scenes will ever be as magnificent as that chestbursting sequence. Head over to our sister site to read about all of the goodies planned for the year. In other news, Rob Zombie is shifting gears on his next effort, putting aside Broad Street Bullies, the hockey project he’d been working on for years, to work on an untitled horror film. He says it’s up the alley of Devil’s Rejects fans, but doesn’t go into any specific plotlines. He talks about it and more with New Zealand’s 3news. Hot damn.

The Walking Dead’s Robert Kirkman Producing Sci-Fi Thriller for Norman Reedus

Creator of the often stellar comic that inspired AMC’s The Walking Dead, Robert Kirkman extending his creative reach into cinema, as he’ll produce the upcoming thriller Air for Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions. Norman Reedus, the crossbow-wielding Daryl on TWD, will be taking the lead for one of his biggest film roles, joined by Blood Diamond’s Djimon Hounsou, who we’ll all get to know as Korath once Guardians of the Galaxy comes out. It’s the first feature for Chris Pasetto, and was written by the co-writer and lead designer for Rockstar Games’ Red Dead Redemption and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. This is quite an interesting bunch.

After a nuclear fallout has left the atmosphere hazardous to life, Reedus and Hounsou are custodians in a cryogenics lab whose hibernating inhabitants are those meant to rebuild the population and establish civilization anew. But their sanity is at stake in such a desolate place, and their own safety within the environment is difficult to maintain. It may not end up straying too heavily into horror, but if it’s psychologically fraught, I’ll end up liking it. I’m completely behind Kirkman carving out his own path through entertainment.

Eli Roth Will Knock Knock His Next Feature Out Soon

While I haven’t always been the biggest fan of Eli Roth’s filmography, I admire and respect how closely he sticks to his gore-soaked guns and makes the films he wants to see regardless of what the financial gain will be. As a follow-up to his cannibal tribe thriller The Green Inferno, Roth recently announced he’ll be directing Knock Knock, for which he’ll team with screenwriters Guillermo Amoedo and Nicolás López, who wrote the Roth-produced Aftershock.

According to TheWrap, Knock Knock will take place in the home of a married man who is unexpectedly the victim of two young girls whose seductive motivations will soon ruin his life. It doesn’t immediately sound over-the-top, but I’m betting ample amounts of blood and nudity will put this closer to Audition than something like The Strangers. With a budget just shy of $10 million, the film will open its doors to production in April.

Somebody is Hiding Something in The Sacrament’s Red Band Trailer and Poster

Director Ti West has is one of the more assured voices in modern indie horror, with 2009’s The House of the Devil and 2011’s The Innkeepers proving he can both tell good stories and create a haunting atmosphere for those stories to fit into. His latest film is the faux documentary The Sacrament – don’t call it found footage – and its new red band trailer is a good example of why so many film festival audiences were raving about it at the end of last year. (And for those that weren’t, maybe they’re just in on the conspiracy.)

The Sacrament tells the story of two VICE journalists (AJ Bowen and Kentucker Audley) who set out to find a friend’s missing sister, while also exposing a religious community in the meantime. Eden Parish, run by a mysterious man called Father (Gene Jones), is a self-sustained paradise, or so the gun-toting defenders would have you believe. It turns out some of the parishioners really want to get out of there, but it’ll take more than just a strong reserve to make an escape possible. Drink the Flavor Aid and catch The Sacrament, produced by Eli Roth, in theaters on June 6, and on VOD May 1. Kneel and worship the film’s new poster seen below.

Zombies Take Over a French Soccer Match in Goal of the Dead

Though I’m not quite following what’s being said in the trailer for the two-part comedic zombie horror Goal of the Dead, I’m fully on board with bringing splatter effects to the sport of soccer, which I’m not all that fond of watching otherwise. One part of the pic will be directed by Benjamin Rocher, who gave the world 2009’s zombies vs. cops ‘n’ robbers horror The Horde, with Atomik Circus co-director Thierry Poiraud handling the other half.

If you can imagine, this isn’t the most complicated storyline to follow. A French Olympic soccer (football, nyeah) team is playing a match in a small Northern French town on their way to the World Cup. Some kind of a viral epidemic runs rampant through the city, and the body parts start flying. So this isn’t an "undead" zombie movie, but we’re fine with that, so long as it breaks the world record for number of body parts kicked off. There are no specific release dates set just yet, but there is a plan to get it out in a timely manner right around the World Cup in June.

Dutch Teaser for The Pool Dips Toes Into Creepiness

Another trailer in which I have no idea what’s being said. Still, I want to know what’s hiding under that water. The Pool (De Poel) is the feature debut of Chris W. Mitchell, who co-wrote the monster mayhem of last year’s Frankenstein’s Army. After so many years of terrible water-centric flicks with cheesy monsters at their center, it’s nice to see something that could be as unsettling as Jason Voorhees’ decrepit body lying at the bottom of Crystal Lake.

As the trailer shows it, the story follows two families who set up camp illegally in a sectioned off forested area, near a picture perfect pond. Their attempt at peace and quiet is interrupted by the pond itself, which exerts a force that makes it impossible for them to leave. The official synopsis actually says, "Rot and decay strike, and madness follows." There’s nothing here taking point on original ideas, but I’ll remain optimistic. I hope Regina Spektor’s "Genius Next Door" is on the soundtrack.

Netflix has been busy planning their push into original programming with several high profile series set to air sometime next year including the return of cult comedy Arrested Development, the David Fincher directed House of Cards adaptation starring Kevin Spacey and Eli Roth's first foray into television with Hemlock Grove. The subscription based 'network' has ordered a 13-episode first season of Roth's horror series, based on the book by Brian McGreevy, and two more just joined the project produced by Gaumont International Television.

Lili Taylor and Kandyse McClure have both been cast in Hemlock - according to TVLine and Deadline respectively - a supernatural whodunnit involving a young girl’s murder in a economically depressed Pennsylvania steel town. Oh, and the town may or may not contain creatures escaped from the local biotech facility owned by the wealthy Godfrey family. But the creatures aren't the only, or even primary, suspects in the murder, with that honor befalling the Godfrey's spoiled son (Bill Skarsgard) and/or a Gypsy teen (Landon Liboiron) who soon team up to clear their names and solve the crime.

Taylor, best known (on the small screen) for her role as Lisa on Six Feet Under will play Liboiron's Gypsy mother in the Netflix original series. On top of being merely a murder mystery, Hemlock will be an exploration in class warfare with the Gypsy family positioned opposite the wealthy Godfrey's played by Dougray Scott, Famke Janssen and Skarsgard.

McClure, who played (Officer then) Lt. Anastasia Dualla on Battlestar Galactica, has joined the cast for the role of Dr. Chausser, "an animal behaviorist with a PHD with a history of self destruction." A history of self-destruction? that sounds like the beautiful McClure is being set-up as somebody's romantic interest. Maybe I'm projecting.

Hemlock Grove will air on Netflix in January, 2013. Check out the prequel graphic novel here.

We recently reported Hostel helmer Eli Roth would be returning to the director's chair for The Green Inferno, a horror feature he co-wrote with Guillermo Amoedo after the pair collaborated on the Chile-set disaster movie Aftershock. At that time Worldview Entertainment was keeping the film's premise top secret, refusing to even reveal its logline. However, the title alone was enough for some horror devotees to suspect Roth's inspiration, and now Variety has confirmed their suspicions.

The trade reported that Constantin Film has acquired the rights to distribute Roth's Green Inferno in Germany, and in their write-up revealed the flick would indeed be a remake of sorts of Antonio Climati's 1988 Natura contro, also known as The Green Inferno or Cannibal Holocaust II. The Italian tale of terror is a lesser-known entry in the cannibal-horror subgenre, but one that is well remembered by cult fans of Italio mondo, a film movement that blended documentary footage with staged scenes to create blood-curling horror. Notably, Natura contro is actually not a sequel to Ruggero's Deodato's notorious Cannibal Holocaust, the moniker Cannibal Holocaust II was just a marketing ploy to lure in foreign audiences. Still, as Roth is known for the kind of ghoulish gore Cannibal Holocaust is alternately reviled and cheered for, you can bet it too will serve as some sort of grisly muse.

But what does all this mean for Roth's Green Inferno? Chiefly that the plot will center on a group of "naïve do-gooders" who survive a terrible plane crash in the midst of the Peruvian jungle only to be the prey of a batch of man-eating tribesmen. So basically, it'll fit well with Roth's established xenophobic horror themes.

The Green Inferno goes into production in Peru and Chile this fall.

From Eli Roth and Gaumont International TV, Hemlock Grove is a new horror series for Netflix based on the just released and critically acclaimed novel by Brian McGreevey. Adapted for the small screen by McGreevy and Lee Shipman with Roth set to direct, the 13-episode first season has been very busy over the last few weeks casting all the key characters. On top of initial hires, Famke Janssen and Bill Skarsgard, the show soon pilfered the fledging Terra Nova for Landon Liboiron, playing another suspect and eventually Skarsgard's partner in solving crime. Today the series nabbed another big name to co-anchor the series in MI:2 villain Dougray Scott.

Deadline announced that Scott is currently in negotiations to play the male lead alongside Janssen in the original horror series. He'll play Norman Godfrey, the older brother of Janssen’s dead husband and, according to the article, "one of the founders of the Godfrey Center for Biomedical Technologies. Wealthy, but with modest tastes and an equally modest home, Norman is sickened by Olivia’s displays of ostentation." All I can say is I really hope that Scott isn't being set up as the seemingly good guy simply to shroud the fact that he's the one ultimately pulling the strings behind the biotech facility curtain.

Hemlock Grove is a supernatural thriller that opens with a young girl's corpse found in the woods of Hemlock Grove, Pennsylvania. The body is mangled in a way that suggests the killer might not be human but something else. Could something have escaped from the local biotech facility? The local biotech facility is owned by the Godfrey family - Norman (Scott) plus sister-in-law Olivia (Janssen), the 'freakish' daughter Shelly (an homage to Frankenstein?), and lastly, son and suspect Roman (Skarsgard). But others think that gypsy kid and self-professed werewolf Peter (Liboiron) might be the real guilty party. And as the case goes cold, Roman and Peter find themselves the primary suspects and therefore, decide to team up Hardy Boys-style and solve the mystery themselves.

Hemlock Grove will air on Netflix in January, 2013. It stars Dougray Scott, Famke Janssen, Bill Skarsgard, Penelope Mitchell, Landon Liboiron and Freya Tingley. From Eli Roth and Gaumont International Television, the series based on the novel of the same name by Brian McGreevy.

Check out the prequel graphic novel here.