We all have a friend who's extremely giving, be it with their time, their patience, or even a gift here and there. But what happens when that generosity becomes awkward and out of place? That's what the trailer to The Gift explores, and you can enjoy the ice cold creepiness for yourself below.
STX Entertainment shared the trailer for the latest offering from thriller juggernaut Blumhouse Productions. What separates The Gift from any typical Blumhouse offering is the fact that co-star Joel Edgerton not only wrote the film's script, but he also took the director's chair for the first time in his career to bring it to the screen. The Gift is about a married couple (Jason Bateman and Rebecca Hall) who become friends with Gordo (Edgerton,) a figure from the past of Bateman's character. At first, Gordo seems friendly enough. He drops by to have a chat and a laugh, and he's very generous with the gifts that he gives the lovely couple.
Unfortunately, what starts as a friendship in bloom fast turns into a dark and twisty series of increasing stakes, centered around a secret so big that it obviously can't be shown in the trailer . While the Blumhouse banner has made its bones mostly through microbudgeted horror pictures, it's branched out into film such as the Academy Award winning Whiplash, showing that the company isn't just about genre fare. It also helps that Joel Edgerton's talents behind the camera look as good as the ones that he shows off in front of it. The Gift looks like a interesting thriller, with style and atmosphere permeating every mysterious frame we're shown in this trailer.
Still, that secret is going to drive the internet crazy if the right amount of people watch The Gift'strailer. What could Jason Bateman be hiding in the past that Edgerton's Gordo just has to terrorize him in order to keep it quiet? Was there a murder? A prank gone wrong? An initiation rite that drove a rift between the two, thus bringing about the apocalypse? Maybe he just knows about the golden thong from Exodus: Gods And Kings. Your guess is as good as ours, but seeing the way The Gift plays with teasing the reveal, it wouldn't be all that disappointing if the film decided to not reveal the secret by the end of the film's story.
While the summer is going to be filled with parallel universes, superheroes galore, and a handful of comedies and dramas to balance things out, it's nice to know that The Gift is ready to bring taut and thrilling mystery to the screen. If this movie lives up to half of the potential it's shown in its trailer, there's a good chance that Joel Edgerton could become more of a directorial threat than anyone could have ever imagined. We'll see if this bet pays off when The Gift opens on July 31st.
