Hurricanes! Florida wildlife gone wild! The blood and guts promise of Aja! Let’s do this, Paramount!
The Hollywood Reporter has announced that Paramount pictures is capitalizing on the success of A Quiet Place, and are going to fast-track the production of Crawl, a story about a young woman trying to survive both a class 5 hurricane and some of Florida’s hungry beasts, while attempting to rescue her father. It’s a survival tale written and to be directed by notable horror director Alexandre Aja, and produced by horror legend Sam Raimi. I first encountered the French director’s work in the vicious and spectacular film Haute Tension (High Tension) which, if not for a questionable switcheroo (spoiler alert), would have made what I consider the best slasher film ever… and has one of the best horror movie sequences of all time in its first act home invasion scene. Aja also directed the very disturbing remake of The Hills Have Eyes. The man is right up there with Eli Roth on the violence meter, so Crawl has the potential to be bloodily spectacular.
Raimi, of course, is the creator of the Evil Dead properties and has lent his hand to productions like Spiderman, and the Great and Magnificent OZ. This should be a very good pairing, and it is doubly encouraging that Paramount is going to be funding more of these ambitious, small-to-mid-budget horror films. Since Paramount is without a tentpole franchise, with the potential exception of Star Trek, seeing them go down the dark and spooky horror path suggests that they may have seen the profit margins of what a well written, well-acted horror movie can produce. A Quiet Place was a real shot in the arm for the studio. $240,000,000 and counting, worldwide, on a $17,000,000 budget. That will get the studio to mimic that success.
No actors have been announced yet, but the story itself holds a lot of current event promise, what with the triple hurricane disaster that was 2017. And, you throw in what the Hollywood Reporter is stating as predators… so I’m thinking alligators. Maybe some big snakes that got flushed down the toilet, or maybe a panther. But wouldn’t it be cool if it was killer manatees? I do hope we get killer manatees.
Oh please! Let these be the villains!