Lionsgate has released the first trailer for The Strangers: Chapter 1. As the title implies, this is just the first part of a new beginning for the franchise, which began in 2008 with Bryan Bertino’s modern home invasion classic. Now, we’re getting an entire trilogy of movies helmed by Renny Harlin (Deep Blue Sea, Exorcist: The Beginning), and it all begins here. Check it out.
So there we have it. This is not our first taste of the new film as the studio previously released a clip, which you can check out right here. But this is just the tip of the iceberg as we have not one but two more movies coming our way in the months ahead. Lionsgate is turning this into a horror event, and it’s admittedly pretty bold to make an entire trilogy of movies rather than go with one movie at a time. It is, if nothing else, a pretty fascinating experiment. The synopsis for the first chapter reads as follows:
"Chapter 1. Madelaine Petsch (TV’s “Riverdale”) stars as a young woman on a road trip with her fiancé. But when they stop at a remote vacation rental in the woods, they become the prey of a vicious gang of masked strangers who attack without warning or reason and must use courage and cunning to survive one long, terrifying night. ”
Alan R. Cohen and Alan Freedland penned the screenplay for the new film based on Bertino’s story. Madelaine Petsch, Froy Guitierrez, Gabriel Basso and Ema Horvath star in the film, with Courtney Solomon, Mark Canton, Christopher Milburn, Gary Raskin, Alastair Burlingham and Charlie Dombek on board as producers. So, why a whole trilogy? In an interview with Fango last year, Solomon explained how that ended up happening.
“I had the idea to tell a much bigger story, but in order to do that, we had to go back and reboot the original, so we could start in the same place. That felt like a truer way to bring it to a new audience. That’s what I told Renny when I first talked to him, that we should be true to the existing audience and not upset them, but actually give them more and answer the questions that have existed for years since the original Strangers.”
Bertino’s The Strangers was a big hit in its day, pulling in $83 million at the box office against a $9 million budget. Its sequel, 2018’s The Strangers: Prey at Night, was a more modest success, taking in $32 million. That’s why the filmmakers felt the need for reinvention, rather than just do a straight-up sequel. It’s a bold move and we’ll see how it shakes out this summer.
The Strangers: Chapter 1 is set to hit theaters on May 31, 2024.
