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Two weeks before the Edinburgh International Film Festival kicks off its 78th edition, Festival Director and CEO Paul Ridd seemed almost at ease.

“We’re not in the eye of the storm,” he said, “but we’re sort of circling it.”

Since taking the helm in late 2023, alongside festival producer Emma Boa, Ridd has overseen a strategic reinvention of one of the world’s oldest film festivals from building a new board and footprint to rethinking its mission within Scotland’s festival-heavy cultural calendar.

“This year is really year one,” he told Variety. “Last year we laid the groundwork, we showed that the new structure could work. Now, it’s about growing on that ballast.”

That growth is visible across the board. EIFF25 presents 43 new feature films, 18 of them world premieres, including the 10-title Sean Connery Competition for Feature Filmmaking Excellence — carrying substantial £50,000 prize awarded by audience vote. Alongside that are six retrospective screenings,...

John McPhail’s family comedy Grow, which is set to release in the fall of 2025, is set to give us our very first chance to watch the new Harry and Hagrid actors in action. Yes, Dominic McLaughlin and Nick Frost, who have been cast as Harry and Hagrid, respectively, in HBO’s Harry Potter series, are set to appear in the film, before the reboot arrives in 2027.

This is a big moment for fans, as everyone is super curious to see how the new cast performs. So, it is safe to assume that Grow—a magical family film about a rebellious girl who moves in with her strict aunt and finds her special power of growing things—might help fans analyze Frost and McLaughlin’s onscreen chemistry.

While Grow has nothing to do with the Wizarding World, it’s still exciting because it’s the first time we’ll see...

John McPhail’s Scottish family comedyGrow, starring Golda Rosheuvel, Nick Frost and Alan Carr, and Campbell X’s BFI-backed Low Riderare among the 18 world premieres selected for this year’sEdinburgh International Film Festival (Eiff), taking place from August 14-20 in Scotland.

Low Rider is one of 10 films competing for the Sean Connery Prize for Feature Filmmaking Excellence, which comes with a £50,000 prize determined by audience vote. The film is a UK-South Africa co-production that follows the adventures of a woman as she flies from London to Cape Town to search for her absent father and stars Emma McDonald and Thishiwe Ziqubu.

Anunciado el trío protagonista de la esperada adaptación televisiva de la saga mágica de J.K. Rowling. © Warner Bros

El reparto de la serie original de HBO de Harry Potter, descrita como una fiel adaptación de los libros de J.K. Rowling, ha confirmado a su trío protagonista. Dominic McLaughlin será Harry Potter, Arabella Stanton interpretará a Hermione Granger y Alastair Stout encarnará a Ron Weasley. Los tres son debutantes y toman el relevo de Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson y Rupert Grint, respectivamente.

McLaughlin, el nuevo Harry, tiene pendiente el estreno de la película de comedia Grow, dirigida por John McPhail. Stanton, futura Hermione, ha participado en dos musicales: Matilda –como protagonista en la Royal Shakespeare Company– y Starlight Express. Stout, que interpretará a Ron, ha aparecido únicamente en un anuncio para la campaña Roll On Jersey Royal Season.

Francesca Gardiner y Mark Mylon han declarado: «Después de una extraordinaria búsqueda...

When most people think of Christmas, they envision sentient snowmen, houses with elaborate light setups synced to songs performed by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, and elves on shelves in various compromising positions. In my house, it’s all about cozy movie marathons leading up to the big day. While films like Die Hard, Scrooged, and The Nightmare Before Christmas always make the rotation, it’s John McPhail’s 2017 musical zombie horror Anna and the Apocalypse that turns the most heads. McPhail’s delightfully deranged, snow-sprinkled symphony of holiday cheer and coming-of-age angst shambles onto screens like High School Musical mixed with Shaun of the Dead, giving audiences the gift of an off-the-wall Christmas-themed comedy with rhythm, gore, and grim tidings.

Anna and the Apocalypse focuses on a group of students from the sleepy town of Little Haven. What begins as an awkward start to a holiday break before graduation quickly escalates...

‘Tis the season to watch holiday-themed horror, so we here at Arrow in the Head have decided to compile a list of the Best Christmas Horror Movies! All of the films below are, at the very least, set around Christmastime, and some of them take the connection to the holidays further than that. Here are the top 12 horror movies that we recommend checking out over the next week:

I Come In Peace (1990)

It’s easy to forget that I Come in Peace (a.k.a. Dark Angel) is set around the Christmas holiday, because Christmas is mostly just represented by some set decorations – and you’re distracted from those decorations by all the awesome stuff going on around them. Dolph Lundgren stars as Jack Caine, a Houston detective who doesn’t play by the rules. He’s stuck working with stuffy, suit-wearing FBI agent Larry Smith (Brian Benben), and these...

Christmas is arriving this week, which means that the final call for holiday preparations is at hand. It’s now time to cram in every last bit of holiday horror our eyeballs can handle.

The good news is that there’s no shortage of Christmas horror available. This week’s streaming picks bring double the dose of holiday horror fun to help you get through the week.

As always, here’s where you can stream these holiday horror movies this week.

For more Stay Home, Watch Horror picks, click here.

Adult Swim Yule Log 2: Branchin’ Out – Max

Casper Kelly’s surprise sequel drops the kitchen sink approach in favor of a more streamlined horror movie that understands just how silly Hallmark holiday movies can be. That’s both good and bad news for the first film’s survivor, Zoe (Andrea Laing). Zoe finds herself in a small-town Christmas wonderland,...

Candy Canes, falling snow, and endless carnage? In Anna and the Apocalypse, a little-known 2017 British Christmas movie directed by John McPhail, all of this is accompanied by some festive song-and-dance and a ton of zombies. Anna and the Apocalypse primarily follows a teen named (you guessed it) Anna as she fights to survive high school and an eventual zombie apocalypse. The cult classic combines a signature British dark humor with catchy tunesby Roddy Hart and Tommy Reilly, including several Christmas tunes, such as the opening number, "Christmas Means Nothing Without You."

Written by Alan McDonald and Ryan McHenry, it is based on McHenry's college short film, Zombie Musical. McHenry was notably inspired by High School Musical, as well as films like Night of the Living Dead and The Rocky Horror Picture Show. From hilarious camp to excessive violence, Anna and the Apocalypse has something for everyone from horror to Broadway fans.

Golda Rosheuvel, Nick Frost, Jeremy Swift, Tim McInnerny and Jane Horrocks lead the cast of Sky Original feature Grow which is being sold internationally by Gfm Film Sales at the Cannes Market.

The film has commenced principal photography in Scotland and will be released in cinemas globally and on Sky Cinema in the UK and Ireland in 2025.

Rosheuvel, best known for Dune and Bridgerton, stars in the family comedy as a curmudgeonly farmer of a pumpkin farm who takes in her newly discovered niece from an orphanage. When the annual pumpkin-growing contest is sabotaged, the farmer learns to nurture her...

Rom Com Zom Musical

After dealing with cryptids in The Mothman Prophecies, giallos in Your Vice is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key and killer baby mamas in Inside (2007), we’re closing out our film coverage for the year with a holiday classic.

Director John McPhail‘s Anna and the Apocalypse finds a group of disaffected teens struggling with the usual holiday-related concerns but throws in the complication of a zombie apocalypse.

Oh and it’s a musical!

Come celebrate the holiday as we unpack all of the songs, the choreography and why Mr. Savage sucks.

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get a new episode every Wednesday. You can subscribe on iTunes/Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, iHeartRadio, SoundCloud, TuneIn, Amazon Music, Google Podcasts, and RSS.

Episode 261 – Anna and the Apocalypse (2017)

We’re tired of pretending that there’s no such thing as a Rom Com Zom Musical!

Dear David is a horror movie co-produced by Lionsgate and BuzzFeed Studios, based on a spooky Twitter thread by Adam Ellis. The film was adapted from the thread by screenwriters Evan Turner and Mike Van Waestars, and directed by John McPhail. The movie follows comic artist Adam as his sleep paralysis leads to strange visions and haunting experiences, blurring the line between online and real life.

Dear David, a tech-savvy horror movie co-produced by Lionsgate and BuzzFeed studios, has had a unique journey from inception to execution. Based on a spooky Twitter thread by Adam Ellis, the movie was adapted for the screen by Evan Turner and Mike Van Waestars and directed by John McPhail (who is best known for Where Do We Go From Here? and the musical horror comedy Anna and the Apocalypse). Adam's tale was also turned into the BuzzFeed article “My Apartment Is Being Haunted By...

As a millennial who eats up repurposed memes like last night’s cold pizza, I might’ve been a bit too excited about a movie digging up a 5-year-old Twitter thread about an allegedly real haunting. And considering just how amazingly Zola fared, there wasn’t a tinge of cynicism in me about an internet thread getting adapted for the fans of real-life horror tropes. Now, I don’t know how the real Adam Ellis feels about the way his story’s been told in John McPhail’s (would it be too mean to think about a pun here?) Dear David. But if you ask me, just like those posts and texts we type up only to press delete instead, this unimaginably uninspired tale of a BuzzFeed artist and his not-so-friendly little boy ghost shouldn’t even have made it to the archives. You might still have a bunch of...

If you were a regular on Twitter back in 2017, you probably came across the viral ghost story thread dubbed “Dear David.” Former BuzzFeed cartoonist Adam Ellis began his tale with the simple but potent promise: “So, my apartment is currently being haunted by the ghost of a dead child and he’s trying to kill me.”

From there, he unfolded the tale through hundreds of tweets — with photographs and hand-drawn images — over a series of weeks, his followers rapt with each update. So naturally, it was only a matter of time before Hollywood came calling.

Five years later, the “Dear David” movie is here, directed by John McPhail (“Anna and the Apocalypse”), who told TheWrap he was drawn to the horror story’s creator as much as he was Ellis’ chilling tale.

“It was the character of Adam Ellis himself. That’s what drew me in,” McPhail said. “Because when it was happening…...

Dear David is a horror film directed by John McPhail from a screenplay by Mike Van Waes. Based on Adam Ellis‘ Twitter thread of the same name, the film revolves around Adam, who finds himself haunted by the specter of a boy after retaliating against some Twitter trolls. Dear David stars Augustus Prew in the lead role with Justin Long and Andrea Bang starring in supporting roles. So, if you love Dear David here are some similar movies you could watch next.

Unfriended (Netflix & Rent on Prime Video) Credit – Universal Pictures

Synopsis: From the producers of The Purge and Ouija and the director of Wanted comes an original thriller where a seemingly innocent prank starts a sequence of events that spirals out of control. Unfriended unfolds over a teenager’s computer screen as she and her friends are stalked by an unseen figure who seeks vengeance for a shaming video...

From classic books to video games to, of course, real life, there is no limit to how far horror movies can go for inspiration. After all, spooky tales can often stem from the most unlikely of places. However, one of this year's most anticipated horror flicks looks at a particularly unusual source material in order to create its own freaky universe. Produced by Lionsgate and Buzzfeed, John McPhail's Dear David, one of 2023's biggest Halloween month releases, is based on a Twitter (or should we say X?) thread.

Twitter is haunted. At least, it was in 2017, when Buzzfeed artist Adam Ellis’ Twitter thread went viral. The thread chronicled his encounters, in real-time, with the ghost of a little boy named Dear David. Because Hollywood loves IP, the thread was quickly picked up by New Line Cinema (and later Lionsgate), and woven into the feature-length haunt, Dear David. Directed by John McPhail with a screenplay by Mike Van Waes, the film endeavors to transcend its Twitter roots, but struggles to turn bite-sized digital morsels into a compelling feature-length haunting.

“…struggles to turn bite-sized digital morsels into a compelling feature-length haunting.”

Buzzfeed artist Adam (Augustus Prew) is constantly under pressure from his boss (played by genre fave Justin Long) to create more and more viral content. Buzzfeed, existing on an economy of memes and cringe culture, is a hungry mistress, constantly looking to churn and burn sensational new content to...

October is in full swing, and so are the horror films at the box office. Next on the lineup is Dear David, a supernatural horror movie that, like many, is based on a supposedly true story. It follows Adam Ellis as he begins to be plagued by an online presence named David. Unsure of what David wants, Adam begins to fall down the rabbit hole trying to discover David's past and who he is.

However, there's plenty more to David than meets the eye, and as Adam learns more about the entity, things only get worse. Adam faces more and more pressure from all sides of his life as he shares his story with the online world, from his boss asking how the story will end to his friends wondering what's going on with him. How will the story end? Even Adam doesn't know.

We had the chance to catch...

A Twitter (now named X) thread that went viral in 2017 will be adapted to the screen in director John McPhail's latest film, Dear David. The horror project is based on the real-life experience that Buzzfeed journalist Adam Ellis (played by The Lord of Rings: The Rings of Power alum Augustus Prew) encountered in his apartment after being haunted by the ghost of a child. The thread lasted for months, and its repercussions remained long after that. After attracting the attention of multiple Twitter followers, the film is about to land in theaters, reaching a whole new audience of horror enthusiasts.

Back in 2017, BuzzFeed writer Adam Ellis wrote out a ghost story (which he swears is completely true) on Twitter, and that story caught so much attention that there was soon talk of a movie adaptation. The project, titled Dear David, was first set up at New Line Cinema in 2018, then made its way over to Lionsgate. Now Lionsgate is gearing up to give Dear David a theatrical, digital, and VOD release on October 13th – and to promote the release, a clip from the movie has arrived online. You can watch it in the embed above.

Anna and the Apocalypse‘s John McPhail has directed the film from a screenplay by Mike Van Waes. The cast of Dear David is headed up by Augustus Prew (Amazon’s Lord of the Rings series), Justin Long (Tusk), Rene Escobar Jr. (Heartland), Cameron Nicoll (Stolen by Their Father), and Andrea Bang (A Million Little Things...

Dear David is an upcoming horror film co-produced by Lionsgate and BuzzFeed studios, based on a Twitter thread by Adam Ellis. The film stars Justin Long, Augustus Prew, and Andrea Bang and is directed by John McPhail, known for Where Do We Go From Here? and Anna and the Apocalypse. The film expands on Ellis' original story, incorporating more traditional horror elements and exploring the impact of the publication of his tweets and article on his chilling experiences. Coming to theaters and digital platforms on October 13th.

Dear David is an upcoming horror film co-produced by Lionsgate and BuzzFeed studios. Dear David stars Justin Long, Augustus Prew, and Andrea Bang and features a story by Evan Turner and Mike Van Waes, based on a Twitter thread by Adam Ellis. The film was directed by John McPhail, whose previous work includes Where Do We Go From Here? and the musical horror comedy Anna and the Apocalypse.

There are a few things that we wish the lead characters of horror movies knew just as confidently as avid horror watchers: Don’t go down in the basement! Don’t go exploring the source of those strange noises! And, under no circumstances, don’t document the eerie things that might be happening in your apartment while you’re asleep, unless you want to open up a portal for some uncanny pests.

For BuzzFeed comic Adam Ellis (Augustus Prew), the cynical center of John McPhail’s soulless and haphazard genre entry “Dear David,” that last rule seems to mean nothing. In that, when strange, potentially supernatural stuff starts happening around his apartment, he elects to monitor the activity. Even worse, when he isn’t asleep he decides to engage with some very real creeps—that is, the growing number of online trolls who seem to attack him from all Twitter directions.

BuzzFeed comic artist Adam Ellis began a Twitter thread in 2017 that went viral as it chronicled the eerie happenings within his apartment, with sleep paralysis giving glimpses of the specter responsible, a young ghost boy with a misshapen head named David. The movie adaptation of that thread, Dead David, aims to expand the paranormal mystery that haunted Ellis by turning inward, using Ellis and his online habits to craft a supernaturally charged cautionary tale of online bullying.

Comic artist Adam (Augustus Prew) is no stranger to internet trolls working for Buzzfeed, but one day, he hits his limit and fires back. His angry replies draw attention, and Adam soon after finds himself experiencing sleep paralysis and bizarre phenomena in his apartment. As the paranormal encounters increase with malevolence, Adam takes to Twitter to detail the happenings. Adam’s boss (Justin Long) encourages him to play up the haunting online, but...

Lionsgate and BuzzFeed are bringing the creepy viral story Dear David to the big screen this Friday the 13th, with Anna and the Apocalypse director John McPhail at the helm.

Dear David adapts the viral 2017 Twitter thread in which then Buzzfeed cartoonist Adam Ellis chronicled the child haunting his apartment. Mike Van Waes wrote the screenplay, and Augustus Prew stars as the fictionalized version of Ellis.

Director John McPhail spoke with Bloody Disgusting ahead of the film’s release in theaters, On Demand, and Digital on October 13, 2023, where he discussed his horror influences, online trolling, and emphasis on character arcs.

For McPhail, good stories always begin and end with great characters.

“Essentially, I make films for people,” he tells Bloody Disgusting. “I make them for an audience. For me, what I’ve always loved is just following the character’s journey. It doesn’t matter what adventure you take me...

Augustus Prew is dreaming of a dead child in the trailer for his upcoming movie Dear David.

The 36-year-old stars as comic artist Adam in the new horror film, which is based on the viral Twitter thread by BuzzFeed comic artist Adam Ellis.

Get more info and watch the trailer inside…

Here’s a synopsis: Shortly after comic artist Adam (Prew) responds to Internet trolls, he begins experiencing sleep paralysis — while an empty rocking chair moves in the corner of his apartment. As he chronicles increasingly malevolent occurrences in a series of tweets, Adam begins to believe he is being haunted by the ghost of a dead child named David. Encouraged by his boss to continue the “Dear David” thread, Adam starts to lose his grip on what is online…and what is real.

Andrea Bang, Rene Escobar Jr., Cameron Nicoll and Justin Long also star. John McPhail directs, with...

Lionsgate and BuzzFeed are bringing the creepy viral story Dear David to the big screen this Halloween, and Bloody Disgusting is serving up an exclusive sneak peek today.

In this exclusive clip from the upcoming horror movie, Adam (Augustus Prew) experiences a sleep paralysis nightmare that begins with the rocking chair in his bedroom seemingly moving on its own. Just before Adam jolts awake, a mysterious boy appears in the chair…

Lionsgate will be releasing the Dear David movie in theaters, On Demand and Digital in time for Halloween on October 13, 2023. Watch the official trailer for Dear David here.

“On August 7th, 2017, popular cartoonist Adam Ellis began telling the story of how a dead child is haunting his apartment and is trying to kill him. His first tweet gained over 55,000 retweets and 76,000 likes,” explains the website Know Your Meme.

Ellis originally tweeted, “My apartment is currently being haunted by the...

The spookiest month of the year has official begun! This year, October has a Friday the 13th to add to the usual Halloween Horror Fest, making this an extra special month for horror fans. Sure enough, the month is jam-packed with loads of horror movies that will be coming out theatrical and on streaming. With Saw X and The Nun in theaters now, here’s our definitive October Horror Movie Preview, packed with spooky movies you can check out all month long!

Totally Killer – Streaming, October 6

Coming to the Prime Video streaming service is director Nahnatchka Khan’s time travel slasher Totally Killer, which stars Kiernan Shipka as a modern day heroine who travels back in time to 1987 so she and a teenage version of her mom (played by Olivia Holt) can take down a masked maniac called the Sweet Sixteen Killer. Time travel + slashing + ’80s setting = high hopes for this one.

Lionsgate and BuzzFeed are bringing the creepy viral story Dear David to the big screen with a brand new horror movie, and we’re debuting the film’s official poster art today.

While you wait for terror to go viral, check out the poster below.

Lionsgate will be releasing the Dear David movie in theaters, On Demand and Digital in time for Halloween on October 13, 2023. Watch the official trailer for Dear David here.

“On August 7th, 2017, popular cartoonist Adam Ellis began telling the story of how a dead child is haunting his apartment and is trying to kill him. His first tweet gained over 55,000 retweets and 76,000 likes,” explains the website Know Your Meme.

Ellis originally tweeted, “My apartment is currently being haunted by the ghost of a dead child and he’s trying to kill me.” The tweet became a thread documenting the alleged haunting.

In the film, “Shortly after...

If you’re a fan of spooky stories, you might have heard of Dear David, the viral Twitter thread that chronicled the alleged haunting of a New York apartment by a child ghost. The thread, which was started by Buzzfeed illustrator Adam Ellis in 2017, captivated millions of readers with its eerie photos, videos and updates. Now, the online phenomenon has been adapted into a feature film by Lionsgate, and it promises to deliver even more chills and thrills.

The film, directed by John McPhail (Anna and the Apocalypse), follows Ellis (played by Augustus Prew) as he investigates the mysterious origins of Dear David, a deformed spirit who supposedly appears in his dreams and in his home. Along the way, he encounters other sinister forces that threaten his sanity and his life. The film also stars Andrea Bang, Justin Long and Barbarian.

Dear David Trailer

The first trailer for Dear David was released this week,...

Back in 2017, BuzzFeed writer Adam Ellis wrote out a ghost story (which he swears is completely true) on Twitter, and that story caught so much attention that there was soon talk of a movie adaptation. The project, titled Dear David, was first set up at New Line Cinema in 2018, then made its way over to Lionsgate. Now Lionsgate has announced that they’ll be giving Dear David a theatrical, digital, and VOD release on October 13th – and along with that announcement comes the unveiling of a trailer, which you can watch in the embed above.

Anna and the Apocalypse‘s John McPhail having directed the film from a screenplay by Mike Van Waes. The cast of Dear David is headed up by Augustus Prew (Amazon’s Lord of the Rings series), Justin Long (Tusk), Rene Escobar Jr. (Heartland), Cameron Nicoll (Stolen by Their Father), and Andrea Bang (A Million Little Things...

Lionsgate and BuzzFeed are bringing the creepy viral story Dear David to the big screen with a brand new horror movie, and the official trailer has been released this afternoon.

We’ve also learned that Lionsgate will be releasing the Dear David movie in theaters, On Demand and Digital on October 13, 2023. Watch the official trailer for Dear David below.

“On August 7th, 2017, popular cartoonist Adam Ellis began telling the story of how a dead child is haunting his apartment and is trying to kill him. His first tweet gained over 55,000 retweets and 76,000 likes,” explains the website Know Your Meme.

Ellis originally tweeted, “My apartment is currently being haunted by the ghost of a dead child and he’s trying to kill me.” The tweet became a thread documenting the alleged haunting.

In the film, “Shortly after comic artist Adam (Augustus Prew) responds to Internet trolls, he begins experiencing sleep paralysis...

Going viral is a nightmare in the first trailer for the upcoming horror movie, Dear David. Coming courtesy of Lionsgate, Dear David is the long-awaited adaptation of a Twitter thread created by BuzzFeed writer Adam Ellis, in which he documented his experiences with the ghost of a boy that was haunting him. You can check out the first trailer for Dear David below.

“After responding to Internet trolls, a man becomes haunted by the ghost of a dead child named David,” the official synopsis for Dear David reads. “Based on the viral Twitter thread by BuzzFeed comic artist Adam Ellis.”

The horror outing will be led by The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power and The Morning Show star Augustus Prew as Adam Ellis, with the supporting cast including Rene Escobar Jr., Cameron Nicoll (Slumberland), Andrea Bang (Kim's Convenience), Rachel Wilson (In the Tall Grass), Ethan Hwang (Riceboy...

A new type of horror story is about to hit the big screen. Collider is thrilled to exclusively share the first trailer for Dear David, the adaptation of Adam Ellis' Twitter thread that took the world by storm in 2017. While it's common for ghosts to appear in places that carry ancient history with them, this specter has adapted to the modern world, using current technology to torture its victim. John McPhail directed the upcoming project, with Augustus Prew playing the protagonist in a story that will make viewers think twice before accepting social media requests from unknown accounts.

We know, we know. Talk of the 'Christmas' holiday season any time before Halloween should be forbidden. Sacrilage even. We agree in principle, however, if we don't talk about the 'other holiday' treats in store for you on Shudder next month what would you do, be spontanious with your watching routine? Your time is precious, valuable, limited and you need to plan ahead. Shudder is keeping the holiday spirit alive by shifting gears and programming films with a leaning towards the yuletide season. The biggest of them all is the contemporary hit, Anna and the Apocalypse, the zombie musical from director John McPhail. The beginning of the month also sees Slient Night and a slew of its sequels also arriving on the platform. As far...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

Justin Long has been cast as a series regular in Goosebumps, Disney+’s live-action series based on R.L. Stine’s bestselling books, Deadline has confirmed. The new version hails from Scholastic Entertainment, the media division of Scholastic, Neal H. Moritz, producer of the Goosebumps and Goosebumps 2 films, and Sony Pictures TV.

Written by Nick Stoller and Rob Letterman, Goosebumps combines teen comedy with horror, action-adventure, mystery and psychological thrill. The series follows a group of five high schoolers who unleash supernatural forces upon their town and must all work together — thanks to and in spite of their friendships, rivalries and pasts with each other — in order to save it, learning much about their own parents’ teenage secrets in the process.

Long will play Nathan Bratt, the new schoolteacher who develops a terrifying connection to a decades-old supernatural murder.

Stoller and Letterman executive produce with Moritz, Pavun Shetty, Conor Welch,...

Exclusive: Tanner Stine (Impulse) and Kaylee Bryant (Legacies) will lead the supernatural horror Spin the Bottle from director Gavin Wiesen (The Art of Getting By), with Justin Long (Barbarian) and Ali Larter (The Rookie) to play supporting roles.

The recently wrapped film written by John Cregan centers on a group of teenagers in small town Texas who unleash a deadly force after playing the famed party game Spin the Bottle in an abandoned house where a grisly massacre once took place.

Christopher Ammanuel (Black Lightning), Ryan Whitney (Reagan), Angela Halili (American Horror Stories), Samantha Cormier (Legion), Hal Cumpston (The Greatest Beer Run Ever) and Tony Amendola (The Curse of La Llorona) round out the cast. Fortress Media Group is financing, with Will Hayes, Jim Valdez, Kyle Hayes and Chris Barish producing. Harrison Kordestani is exec producing, with Scot Ruggles serving as co-producer.

Stine has previously appeared on series including Impulse,...

Exclusive: Lionsgate and BuzzFeed have revealed details about their third movie tie-up, Dear David.

The supernatural thriller was originally set up at New Line with Dan Lin producing but we can reveal that the project is now set as the next production on Lionsgate and BuzzFeed’s feature slate.

Based on a true story and one of the first Twitter urban legends, Dear David will tell the story of Adam Ellis, a former BuzzFeed employee and social media content creator who becomes haunted by the ghost of a boy possessed by a demonic entity. In 2018, Ellis’s Twitter thread about his experiences with the ghost he called ‘Dear David’ went viral, gaining him more than a million followers on the platform.

The film will be directed by John McPhail, whose made his debut on 2017 zombie horror-comedy Anna And The Apocalypse. Screenplay is by Mike Van Waes. We hear this is...

Technicolor lights are about to illuminate every other home in the neighborhood; carolers are marching through the streets; even that old tree in Rockefeller is shining brightly.

For some folks, that’s enough to make you want to grab an axe. But don’t do that. Watch demented men dressed as Santa Claus or a demon Krampus indulge your Anti-Christmas sentiments with maximum gore. Indeed, this list isn’t about the most charming, heartwarming, or schmaltzy Christmas viewing traditions. Nah, this is about the 20 grossest, nastiest, and all around most fun Christmas horror movies. The kind where the greatest gift you’re going to get on Christmas morning is escaping with your life and maybe some psychological triggers whenever you see jolly men in red suits.

Yep, these are the very best Christmas horror movies. Ho. Freaking. Ho.

Anna and the Apocalypse (2017)

Almost certainly one of the sweetest, most positive,...

Here’s another interview in Nerdly’s socially distanced series of chats with filmmakers as part of the Nerdly Out Loud podcast for Nerdly.co.uk. This time Kevin sits down with Special Delivery director John McPhail (Anna and the Apocalypse), whose short film forms part of 20th Digital’s Bite Size Halloween.

20th Digital Studio is to premiere a series of 30 diverse, genre-bending short films for Halloween 2020. Bite Size Halloween ranges from horror comedy to psychological thrillers and everything in between. Created by up-and-coming filmmakers, these films will screen across digital and broadcast platforms Freeform, FX, and Hulu’s Huluween platform hub and YouTube channel.

Bite Size Halloween 2020 features 30 exciting new filmmakers, amplifying their voice in the film community. This year’s cohort includes a well-rounded group of filmmakers representing different countries, identities, and backgrounds. The long term goal of 20th Digital Studio’s short film programs is to...

Here’s another interview in Nerdly’s socially distanced series of chats with filmmakers as part of the Nerdly Out Loud podcast for Nerdly.co.uk. This time Kevin sits down with Eye Exam director Aislinn Clarke (The Devils Doorway), whose short film forms part of 20th Digital’s Bite Size Halloween.

A woman is waiting for her eye exam when the last customer runs out screaming.

20th Digital Studio is to premiere a series of 30 diverse, genre-bending short films for Halloween 2020. Bite Size Halloween ranges from horror comedy to psychological thrillers and everything in between. Created by up-and-coming filmmakers, these films will screen across digital and broadcast platforms Freeform, FX, and Hulu’s Huluween platform hub and YouTube channel.

Bite Size Halloween 2020 features 30 exciting new filmmakers, amplifying their voice in the film community. This year’s cohort includes a well-rounded group of filmmakers representing different countries, identities, and backgrounds.

Here’s another interview in Nerdly’s socially distanced series of chats with filmmakers as part of the Nerdly Out Loud podcast for Nerdly.co.uk. This time Kevin sits down with The Mime co-directors Gavin Williams (Await Further Instructions) and Mark Lediard, whose short film forms part of 20th Digital’s Bite Size Halloween.

A self-involved pedestrian accidentally angers a sinister street Mime, and pays a heavy price.

20th Digital Studio is to premiere a series of 30 diverse, genre-bending short films for Halloween 2020. Bite Size Halloween ranges from horror comedy to psychological thrillers and everything in between. Created by up-and-coming filmmakers, these films will screen across digital and broadcast platforms Freeform, FX, and Hulu’s Huluween platform hub and YouTube channel.

Bite Size Halloween 2020 features 30 exciting new filmmakers, amplifying their voice in the film community. This year’s cohort includes a well-rounded group of filmmakers representing different countries, identities,...

It’s been a little while since we’ve seen a teen movie adaptation of a William Shakespeare play, but get ready to party like it’s the year 2000, because a new one is in development at Amazon Studios. John McPhail, who directed the delightful Christmas-themed zombie musical Anna and the Apocalypse, is keeping his musical streak […]

The post Lady Macbeth Ya Musical in the Works From ‘Anna and the Apocalypse’ Director appeared first on /Film.

Back in my day, high school movies based on Shakespeare were all the rage, from 10 Things I Hate About You to the controversial drama O. The Bard's work indeed offers fertile ground for modern adaptations, including those told through a Ya lens, and to that end, Amazon Studios is mounting a teenage Lady Macbeth musical that will be produced by Channing Tatum and Scooter Braun. Anna and the Apocalypse helmer John McPhail will direct from a script by up-and-coming writer S.J. Inwards. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the untitled film will follow a teenage girl …...

Amazon Studios is screwing its courage to the sticking place, picking up an untitled Lady Macbeth feature project that has Scooter Braun and Channing Tatum among its producers.

And among the unique distinguishing spots on the project is that it is a musical and Ya-centric.

Rising scribe S.J. Inwards will write the project while John McPhail, who made the zombie horror comedy musical Anna and the Apocalypse, will direct.

Braun, Scott Manson and James Shin will produce the untitled Lady Macbeth musical through Sb Projects. Tatum will produce with his partners Reid Carolin, Peter Kiernan and Michael Parets via ...

Amazon Studios is screwing its courage to the sticking place, picking up an untitled Lady Macbeth feature project that has Scooter Braun and Channing Tatum among its producers.

And among the unique distinguishing spots on the project is that it is a musical and Ya-centric.

Rising scribe S.J. Inwards will write the project while John McPhail, who made the zombie horror comedy musical Anna and the Apocalypse, will direct.

Braun, Scott Manson and James Shin will produce the untitled Lady Macbeth musical through Sb Projects. Tatum will produce with his partners Reid Carolin, Peter Kiernan and Michael Parets via ...

Here’s the latest episode of the The Filmmakers Podcast, part of the ever-growing podcast roster here on Nerdly. If you haven’t heard the show yet, you can check out previous episodes on the official podcast site, whilst we’ll be featuring each and every new episode as it premieres.

For those unfamiliar, with the series, The Filmmakers Podcast is a podcast about how to make films from micro budget indie films to bigger budget studio films and everything in-between. Our hosts Giles Alderson, Dan Richardson, Andrew Rodger and Cristian James talk how to get films made, how to actually make them and how to try not to f… it up in their very humble opinion. Guests will come on and chat about their film making experiences from directors, writers, producers, screenwriters, actors, cinematographers and distributors.

The Filmmakers Podcast #166: How to go from Shorts to Features, Raise Finance...

Mark Harrison Dec 23, 2019

From Christmas Eve capers to Michael Shannon pretending to be Bigfoot, here are some more unusual Christmas movie picks for this season

Despite only being in season for about a month of the year, Christmas movies are a booming business. Outside of big-screen offerings like Paul Feig’s Last Christmas and a new version of Black Christmas, the Hallmark Channel has produced a whopping 40 new festive movies for 2019 and Netflix has turned out a range of original films too.

Few of the new films produced each year will join the annual rotation of classics like The Muppet Christmas Carol and It’s A Wonderful Life, but not everyone wants to watch the same films once a year every year. If you’re looking for something festive that you might have missed, or you just haven’t seen in a long time, or even something that isn’t about either Santa or Scrooge,...

Stars: Ella Hunt, Malcolm Cumming, Sarah Swire, Christopher Leveaux, Ben Wiggins, Marli Siu, Mark Benton, Paul Kaye | Written by Alan McDonald, Ryan McHenry | Directed by John McPhail

Director John McPhail takes genre mash-up to new heights with this hugely entertaining Scottish horror comedy that plays like Shaun of the Dead meets High School Musical. It’s derived from the 2011 Scottish short Zombie Musical, whose late director Ryan McHenry (also responsible for the Ryan Gosling Won’t Eat His Cereal meme) co-wrote the script before his tragic death in 2015.

Ella Hunt (Robot Overlords) plays Anna, a sixth former at her school in the small town of New Haven, who clashes with her widowed father (Mark Benton) over her desire to spend a year travelling instead of going off to university. Soon, however, Anna realises she has much bigger problems on her hands, as New Haven faces a full-on zombie apocalypse.

Banding...

David Crow Oct 18, 2019

In honor of Zombieland: Double Tap, we rank all the movies that mixed yuks with human chunks in the zombie comedy subgenre.

For those old enough to remember a time before The Walking Dead premiered on AMC, it’s strange to admit we’ve reached a zombie saturation point. Believe it or not, there was a moment where you were not inundated with zombie movies, zombie TV shows, zombie video games, and zombie memes. Rather the undead were a cult novelty that allowed indie filmmakers to speak truth to power… via allegories involving lots of brain-munching and disembowelment. What could be better?

Now it’s hard to take a single step in the pop culture landscape without landing on a reanimated corpse with a belly full gray matter—not that this should be treated as the end of the world. Indeed, as you’ll see in many of the movies below,...

It is a glorious week to be a horror fan, because we have a ton of amazing Blu-rays and DVDs heading home on Tuesday. And while there’s a lot to be excited about, on a personal note, I’m beyond thrilled that Anna and the Apocalypse is finally getting a tangible home media release, because I feel like I’ve been waiting forever to add a copy of John McPhail’s delightful musical to my own collection of movies.

Beyond that, the amazing-looking House of Hitchcock Collection arrives this Tuesday, and looks to be a must-own set for any Alfred Hitchcock fans out there. Kino Lorber is showing some love to Nightmare Beach this week with their special edition release, and Arrow Video has put together a much-deserved limited edition set for The Prey as well. We also have a few genre favorites making their 4K Ultra HD debut this week: The Shining,...

Hey everyone! The 15th annual Fantastic Fest kicks off this week, and this year, it’ll be myself, Heather Wixson, as well as Emily von Seele and Adrian Torres, who will be bringing you all kinds of coverage out of Austin for the duration of the festival. To celebrate Fantastic Fest’s momentous birthday this year, we have picked a few of our favorite films that have debuted over the years, and will be celebrating them as we lead up to the kickoff of Fantastic Fest on Thursday.

Enjoy!

Anna and the Apocalypse (Heather Wixson): When you talk about crowd-pleasing movies that are best enjoyed in a packed theater filled with genre enthusiasts, Anna and the Apocalypse is without a doubt the type of film that makes Fantastic Fest as much fun as it is. I know I’ve discussed my love of Anna ad nauseam over the last...