It’s been a while since we last heard from director Neill Blomkamp. Since his career crash-landed with the tense-as-hell alien apartheid allegory District 9, critics and fans have been somewhat confused by his choices. He went all-in on video game-style action with Elysium and helped the world better understand Short Circuit with the pseudo-remake Chappie. Nevertheless, his movies have been steadily getting worse reviews and his box office take has steadily declined. During this time, he’s been locked away, presumably under the control of the Weyland-Yutani Corporation, writing an Alien reboot or one of those “forget about the other sequels” soft reboot/sequel thingies. Though ever since that fizzled out (it’s still kind of unclear whether they’re making any Alien movies at Disney), Blomkamp took a chance on doing a RoboCop sequel, which also didn’t pan out, and even hinted at doing District 10.
But before all that, it looks like he’s ready to scare people again.
Leaving Chappie somewhere in a dank alley, beaten and bloody like that friendly robot that was collectively murdered by the city of Philadelphia, Blomkamp returns with Demonic, a supernatural sci-fi thriller about a woman who enters a haunted computer program. At least, that’s what we can glean from the trailer. The logline on the movie is “a young woman unleashes terrifying demons when supernatural forces at the root of a decades old rift between mother and daughter are revealed.” Sounds interesting, but the teaser trailer doesn’t give us a whole lot of information. There are hints of The Matrix, A Nightmare On Elm Street, and Insidious throughout this minute-and-a-half teaser, and honestly, that sounds pretty sick. The logo is also spelled with an upside-down cross instead of an “I,” which is also pretty sick. All in all, this teaser gets a “pretty sick” from the “how-sick-is-this-trailer” commission.
Demonic comes out in theaters and VOD on August 20.
25 Comments
I’m on board.
I’ll definitely check it out
I would give this one a chance, if anything because IFC Midnight-distributed movies have a better average for being at least decent.
The trailer was too boring to finish watching.
it tells us absolutely nothing. why do i want to see this film?
maybe i’m old now, but haven’t people been complaining about trailers showing too much for decades now?
Telling us nothing, but giving tone and style is something I wish 100% other trailers did.
These days I feel compelled to stop watching trailers halfway through because I don’t want to know so much. I think this is an interesting way to do it.Also, I would point out that The District 9 trailer and promotional materials were also quite memorable in the way that they got you excited and interested in something that you didn’t know anything about.
It was very deeply meh.
No, it wasn’t.
I super hate to say it but Neil was sort of a M.Night character who did very well with some well crafted gimmicks but then that gimmick just either doesn’t work anymore or he’s unable to continue doing it for some reason. So he spread his wings a bit with Aliens and Robocop and now horror and it just doesn’t seem like that’s where his strengths are. This trailer just isn’t very attractive and shockingly generic feeling.
It’s scary until you realize that Sharlto Copley’s the demon.
I’m glad Neil’s coming back for another one. His stuff is inconsistent but always really imaginative, which is basically the opposite of what every studio looks for in a director these days. Wasn’t sure if he’d ever even want to make another feature after Ridley Scott decided he was so embarrassed by Prometheus that he had to pull a Jay Leno to Blomkamp’s Conan on Alien: Covenant.
Carly Pope turned into Noomi Rapace so gradually I never noticed.
the demon was inside her all along!
Which will also be the plot of the porn parody.
Truly, we are the real demons…
“But before all that, it looks like he’s ready to scare people again.”
Again?
Note: His name is spelled NEILL Blomkamp, with two Ls. It is misspelled multiple times in this story, including the headline.
“There’s another Neil Blomkamp with only one L, and he has no sense of humor at all.”
I loved District 9, but yeah his subsequent works just didn’t hit the same notes for me. I forsee this trend continuing.
I thought his Oats shorts were consistently good so im actually excited for this
that deep chant, damn!!! could end up the new Nolan-esk broooom….
Maybe it’s just me, but this is how I wish more trailers were. Set the tone and give me a hint of what to expect but mostly leave me saying ‘”WTF” and wanting to see the actual film to figure out what’s going on.
WOW, i didn’t know he made all those movies. Considering I think every single one of them sucked i probably will be avoiding this movie.