In the past year, many classic horror projects, such as IT, Suspiria and Pet Sematary, have been remade by Hollywood, and this trend doesn’t look to be slowing down anytime soon. Next week, Child’s Play will get the same treatment and it’s now been announced that Blumhouse Productions have answered the call to reimagine of the 1974 cult-classic Black Christmas.
Four years before Halloween redefined the genre with the ultimate slasher flick, Bob Clark’s Black Christmas did it first, as it told the story of a group of sorority girls who are stalked and then murdered by a mysterious killer one by one during the holidays. The film starred It’s Olivia Hussey and Superman’s Lois Lane, Margot Kidder.
The new Black Christmas will be directed by Sophia Takal, who previously helmed the 2016 thriller Always Shine and a segment of Hulu’s Into the Dark series titled New Year, New You. Takal co-wrote the script with April Wolfe, per Slash Film. The slasher flick will star Green Room’s Imogen Poots and a slew of young television talent: Aleyse Shannon from CW’s Charmed, Brittany O’Grady from CW’s The Messengers, Lily Donoghue and Caleb Eberhardt.
Takal will mark the first female director to helm a feature by Blumhouse Productions. The remake will center on sorority girls attending Hawthorne College as an unknown killer hunt them down. This Black Christmas will switch up the script to go along with today’s trend of empowered women, as film’s synopsis details this in its description:
The killer is about to discover that this generation’s young women aren’t willing to become hapless victims as they mount a fight to the finish.
Sorority girls working together instead of pitting against one another? That’ll be a new and perhaps refreshing exploration of college life on the big screen. The movie is set to soon begin production in New Zealand and head to theaters later this year on December 13, 2019. Check out the movie poster below:
Oh, Friday the 13th: how fittingly spooky! The holiday release does give the movie heavy competition as it opens against the Jumanji sequel, one week before Star Wars: The Rise of the Skywalker.
The upcoming film will follow a disappointing 2006 remake starring Arrow’s Katie Cassidy, Michelle Trachtenberg, Mary Elizabeth Winstead and Lacey Chabert. The film has a $9 million budget and grossed just $21 million at the box office. Blumhouse has had tons of recent success with their low-budget horror remakes, such as with Halloween which grossed $253.7 on a $10 million budget.
The studio also has a Spawn and The Craft remake in the works, and have been in discussions about making new Scream and Hellraiser films. The studio is also developing a new Invisible Man movie for 2020, among other exciting horror flicks soon coming under the horror label.
Are you excited for the Black Christmas remake? Let us know in the comments below.
