Movies
Raimi Launches Spooky Pictures with ‘The Substitute’
Sam Raimi’s genre label Ghost House is launching Spooky Pictures as a new banner that will produce thrillers for family audiences. First pic will be The Substitute, a remake of the Danish thriller that Scott Derrickson (The Exorcism of Emily Rose, The Day the Earth Stod Still) will helm and Columbia Pictures will co-finance and distribute through a first-look deal with Spooky.
Announcement follows a similar label launch by Disney, which is pairing up with Guillermo del Toro to make scary pics for family auds through Double Dare You (Daily Variety, Sept. 11), and signals the kind of thrillers Hollywood may soon be unspooling at the megaplex. Should the labels find an audience, the shift away from slasher fare and the like, often referred to as “gore porn,” is likely.
Project revolves around a terrified sixth-grade class as the students race to reveal to their parents that their new substitute teacher is an evil alien being.
Derrickson is penning the script with Paul Harris Boardman, who co-wrote “Emily Rose” with Derrickson. The two also collaborated on the redo of Fox’s “The Day the Earth Stood Still.”
Ole Bornedal originally wrote and directed “The Substitute,” which bowed in 2007.
Spooky will finance, develop and produce its own family fare under Ghost House, which has a deal with Mandate Pictures.
Raimi and Rob Tapert (“The Grudge” series and “30 Days of Night”) will serve as producers of the “Substitute” remake through Spooky, while Russell Hollander and Nathan Kahane will serve as executive producers. Tendo Nagenda and J.R. Young will shepherd for Spooky.
Pic’s original filmmakers, Bornedal and Michael Obel, will produce through their Thura Films banner.
Maika Monroe (Longlegs) and director David Robert Mitchell are reuniting for It Follows sequel They Follow, and Deadline brings us the latest casting news this week.
Jackie Earle Haley (Little Children, A Nightmare on Elm Street), Justine Lupe (Succession), Anna Mirodin (Ivan), Jayne Taini (Unbelievable), Michael Gandolfini (Daredevil: Born Again), Tom Pecinka (Stereophonic), Melora Walters (Magnolia), Ben Krieger (Song Sung Blue), Natalie Shinnick (The Brutalist) and Jan Hoag (The Fabelmans) have joined the cast this week.
Naomi Ackie (Blink Twice) has also been confirmed to join They Follow.
Deadline notes in their report this afternoon, “Plot details for the long-anticipated sequel are under wraps, other than it taking place a decade after the events of the original film.”
They Follow is expected to enter production this Summer. Stay tuned for updates.
In the first movie, Maika Monroe’s Jay Height is a young woman followed by an unknown supernatural force after a sexual encounter. In the sequel, the threat is now EVERYWHERE.
“It’s very dark,” Monroe recently teased. “We’re pushing the boundaries on this one for sure.”
“It’s very different from the original,” Monroe told Discussing Film. “The original is a little more heightened and dramatic, and this is really quite grounded and follows the story of these two women that are mentally dealing with a lot. I thought it was really an interesting take on it.”
NEON and Good Fear Content are producing They Follow.
They Follow will feature a new score from Disasterpeace.
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