Check out the first trailer for Suspiria – I’m really trying to keep an open mind about Luca Guadagnino’s updating of Dario Argento’s Suspiria, but it’s tough. You really can’t improve something that’s already essentially perfect, so I’m not entirely sure why we needed a remake in the first place.

Concerns aside, we now have a new trailer for the upcoming film and it looks pretty intriguing. Guadagnino’s clip doesn’t resemble Argento’s film visually, but there are plenty of little nods to the original in the preview. Perhaps the hardest thing to accept here is the score; Goblin’s score is so synonymous with Suspiria that seeing this trailer with different music is oddly unsettling.

Will Guadagnino’s film live up to its inspiration? That seems unlikely, but we’ll find out for sure on November 2.

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Pumpkinhead reboot lands a screenwriter – It’s been several years since Peter Block announced he’d landed the rights to the Pumpkinhead franchise and planned a reboot, but today we’ve got an update.

Deadline reports that S. Darko screenwriter Nate Atkins has sold a pitch for a horror film titled Saci (based on a Brazilian myth), which is pretty interesting, but buried further down in the article is this tidbit:

“Atkins is currently working on the Netflix rom-com sequel A Christmas Prince: The Royal Wedding and the horror reboot Pumpkinhead for producer Peter Block.”

While there’s nothing more mentioned than that, I guess those of us who’d assumed Block’s reboot dreams were deader than Lance Henriksen’s kid in the original film owe the man an apology. FX guru Stan Winston made his directorial debut with Pumpkinhead, which has gone on to become a bonafide cult classic.

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Help horror author Brian Keene – Author Brian Keene has had a storied career, publishing countless novels and comics, winning Stoker awards, and earning a Grandmaster award at the World Horror Convention a few years back. He’s also been a noted philanthropist, raising money for the less fortunate through his annual telethon for Scares That Care. Now, he needs the horror community’s help.

Brian, who’s been a friend of mine since we were both struggling to break into professional writing three decades ago, suffered third degree burns on his face and arm this week. As a writer, he doesn’t have health insurance and with a lengthy stay in a burn unit lying ahead, and the inability to write while he recovers, things are going to be tough financially.

You can help Brian weather the financial challenges ahead by donating to his GoFundMe account. In just a day, fans have raised nearly $35,000 to help pay for Brian’s recovery, but as anyone who’s spent days and weeks in a hospital knows, this is a proverbial drop in the bucket. So, if you have a few extra bucks to spare, please consider helping one of the best people in the horror community.

You can contribute here.

Halloween trailer debuts tomorrow – That’s right, after what seems like an eternity of waiting, we finally get our first official look at David Gordon Green’s Halloween reboot tomorrow.

To get everyone ready, the production released several images of Jamie Lee Curtis and Michael Myers this week, along with this new teaser trailer for the trailer.

Halloween opens nationwide this October.

In two days… #HalloweenMovie pic.twitter.com/ogOB2mqVKp

— #HalloweenMovie (@halloweenmovie) June 6, 2018

Horror on the Horizon

Finally, the horror drought at the box office has ended.

This Friday, June 8, you can head to your local theater to catch Hereditary, a film being hailed as one of the best horror features of the year. Here’s the plot breakdown:

“When Ellen, the matriarch of the Graham family, passes away, her daughter’s family begins to unravel cryptic and increasingly terrifying secrets about their ancestry. The more they discover, the more they find themselves trying to outrun the sinister fate they seem to have inherited.

“Making his feature debut, writer-director Ari Aster unleashes a nightmare vision of a domestic breakdown that exhibits the craft and precision of a nascent auteur, transforming a familial tragedy into something ominous and deeply disquieting, and pushing the horror movie into chilling new terrain with its shattering portrait of heritage gone to hell.”

This one is currently sitting at 98% on the TomatoMeter. Now the question is whether or not fans will love it as much as the critics.

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Unfortunately, that’s it for horror on the big screen for the next two weeks, but hey, it’s nice to get something.

Horror on Home Video

Lots of new titles coming to home video over the next two weeks, so let’s just dive in.

June 12 brings us a 2-disc special edition set of Sasquatch-sploitation flick Abominable. I’m down to watch pretty much anything that has Jeffrey Combs in it, so this is a must see for me.

Darren Lynn Bousman is back this week, with his new feature The Devil’s Carnival, which is exactly what the title describes: a carnival in hell. This short film (with a 55 minute runtime) is a horror musical, sort of like Bousman’s Repo: The Genetic Opera. Check it out if you’re into that sort of thing.

The big release this week is clearly The Strangers: Prey at Night. Many of us thought the long-awaited sequel to Bryan Bertino’s The Strangers would never happen, but it did, and now you can catch it from the comfort of home if you missed it on the big screen earlier this year.

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The week of June 19 is pretty light on horror fare, but there are a lot of sci-fi and cult titles on the docket.

The biggest of the bunch is Pacific Rim: Uprising –- the improbable sequel to Guillermo del Toro’s mechs vs. Kaiju summer release from a few years back. If you wanted more of that action, you’ll want to grab this disc.

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When the fourth version of A Star Is Born was confirmed in August 2016, we speculated that Bradley Cooper’s role in the movie would “not involve any singing.” How wrong we were!

The first person we see in the first trailer for the film is Cooper, singing in front of a large crowd. He stars as Jackson Maine, a seasoned musician whose career is gradually declining, in large part due to his own internal demons. Then he meets Ally (Lady Gaga), a struggling singer and songwriter. Soon thereafter, a star is born.

Advance reactions have been very positive. Watch the first trailer below and then catch up on all we know about the upcoming musical drama.

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First, what were the previous versions?

The original version in 1937, starring Janet Gaynor and Fredric March, established the tragic trajectory of a doomed romance set in Hollywood, supposedly drawing inspiration from several different real-life relationships. The movie was nominated for seven Academy Awards and won two.

In 1954, the first remake featured Judy Garland as an aspiring singer and James Mason as a fading, former star actor in Hollywood. It received six Academy Award nominations, though it didn’t win any. The second remake in 1976 starred Barbra Streisand in the role of an aspiring singer, opposite Kris Kristofferson as an established rock star on his way down. It earned four Academy Award nominations and won one for best song.

What makes this new version markedly different?

All the music is original and was recorded live. Lady Gaga performs original songs in the film, which she wrote with Cooper and other artists.

How did this new version develop?

As often happens, the film has been in development for years. Back in 2011, it looked like Beyonce might star and Clint Eastwood might direct, but that didn’t work out. Bradley Cooper came on board as both director and star in March 2015, giving the project the momentum it needed to become a “go” production.

Who else is starring?

Andrew Dice Clay, Dave Chappelle and Sam Elliott.

When can we see it?

Warner Bros. will open A Star Is Born in theaters on October 5, 2018.

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Update: Hugo Weaving (The Matrix) is revealed to be a very evil character in a new trailer for Mortal Engines. He stars as a ruthless leader who wields far too much power for his own good, or for the benefit of anyone else, as heroic assassin Hera Hilmar and lower-class historian Robert Sheehan quickly discover to their dismay.

We’ve gathered all we know about the movie below, but right now, just sit back and let the amazing spectacle of Mortal Engines wash over you (again).

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(Read our previous post below.)

Universal Pictures has pulled back the curtains on Mortal Engines, a steampunk fantasy film presented by Peter Jackson. Jackson is also responsible for the film’s adapted screenplay alongside writing partners Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, the trio behind The Lord of the Rings. For some filmgoers that will be enough to go on, but let’s check out the trailer and see why this “epic new saga” is worthy of our attention.

Watch it below:

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What’s the movie about?

Based on the Philip Reeve’s series of the same name, Mortal Engines has one of the craziest concepts I’ve heard of in some time. Here’s the official synopsis: “Many years after the ‘Sixty Minute War,’ cities survive a now desolate Earth by moving around on giant wheels attacking and devouring smaller towns to replenish their resources.”

Yeah, you read that right. Metropolises are driving around the post-apoc neighborhood gobbling up villages! The trailer showcases this insane feat and has already led some to describe it as Howl’s Moving Castle meets Mad Max: Fury Road. Um, yes please! It also reminds me of Snowpiercer, a story wherein the survivors of a climate-change experiment are all passengers on a train that travels around the frozen world. Big ideas can be realized on the big screen with the right team. If this trailer is any indication, this is the right team.

Who’s in the movie?

Icelandic actress Hera Hilmar (pictured above) is front and center in the teaser. She plays Hester Shaw, a resident of a small mining town called Salthook. You may have seen Hilmar in Joe Wright’s Anna Karenina or the TV series Da Vinci’s Demons. A starring role in Mortal Engines could be just the trick to catapult her career to new heights.

While not featured in the trailer, Hugo Weaving, Stephen Lang, Robert Sheehan and JiHAE co-star.

Who’s directing?

Christian Rivers. He is a fellow Kiwi and longtime collaborator with Peter Jackson. Rivers has storyboarded all of Jackson’s live-action films since Dead Alive, including both The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogies. Additionally, he has worked on the visual effects for many of Jackson’s films. Mortal Engines is River’s feature-length directorial debut. His unique background has undoubtedly prepared him for imagining a sci-fi fantasy film of this magnitude.

When does it come out?

Mortal Engines rolls into theaters on December 14, 2018.

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