Over the past couple years, the internet has given birth to some rather creepy urban legends, with the most famous one probably being that of "Slender Man." An impossibly tall, blank faced figure in a black suit, he pursues his prey in the woods, and has the ability to teleport at will. Basically, if you've seen him, it's already too late, and your only choice is how you'll go out. Naturally, as any good legendary figure of horror will tell you, the more your legend grows, the more likely a film will be made based off of it. Which is exactly what's happen with Slender Man, under the direction of newly hired director Sylvain White.
Deadline reported White's hiring, which has raised some eyebrows as he's best known for directing Stomp The Yard and The Losers, neither of which suggests a horror pedigree on Sylvain White's resume. However, upon digging a little deeper into the director's resume, you can see that he's not only directed episodes of horror flavored shows like Sleepy Hollow and The Originals, he also directed an episode of The Following. So with those three shows in his canon of work, it's clearer to see that Sylvain White may be the right person for Slender Man's directing duties for one, very important reason: he's used to the tight fit of a TV show's schedule.
What does that say about Slender Man? Well, it says that Screen Gems, Sony's genre focused subsidiary, will be looking to keep the film in the micro-budget model that most of its offerings operate within. So with a smaller budget than most horror films, Sylvain White will know how to keep things tight, on time, and around budget, which will be important to the film's chances of becoming a hit. Of course, there's one big obstacle to Slender Man's fortunes, without any film being spent: it's an urban legend that's inspired some real life crimes. In fact, HBO has a documentary, Beware The Slenderman, that premieres on January 23rd, which covers the actual legend, as well as the stabbing it inspired. You can see the trailer for that film below.
Real life controversy or not, the subject of Slender Man is something that's perfect for a fictional horror film to be centered around. So long as the fiction doesn't step on the toes of the true events, Screen Gems and Sylvain White should be just fine with whatever they hatch together. Let's just hope that's closer to what's being discussed at this moment. Slender Man is slated to start production in the spring, so there's still time to fine tune the overall story as much as humanly possible. Meanwhile, you can watch Beware The Slenderman on HBO, when it premieres on January 23rd at 10 PM EST.
