Star-studded cinematic horror Until Dawn is getting a big screen adaptation, an ‘R-rated love letter to the horror genre’-

Shazam director David F. Sandberg has decided to take some time off from superhero movies in order to film horrible things happening to some people on a mountain. He’s been enlisted to direct an adaptation of Until Dawn, Supermassive’s first cinematic horror choose-your-own adventure that was the precursor to things like The Quarry and The Dark Pictures Anthology.

For now at least, Until Dawn is still trapped on PlayStation, but if you’ve ever played The Quarry you pretty much have the gist of it. The game follows the story of a group of hapless teens stuck on a mountain as a bunch of bloody horror stuff unfolds. In the game, those teens were played by actors like Rami Malek and Hayden Panettiere, and it also featured Peter Stormare as the world’s most upsetting therapist. 

There’s no word yet on if any of the game’s stars will make a return for the film, but per The Hollywood Reporter, production company Screen Gems is calling the film “an R-rated love letter to the horror genre, centering on an ensemble cast.” Yup, sure sounds like Until Dawn to me.

The announcement follows a sustained push by Sony to get a bunch of its big games onto the silver screen, a process which gave birth to the (not especially well-loved) Gran Turismo movie and the (better received) Last of Us TV show last year. The world waits, breath bated, for the inevitable explosive appearance of the Knack Cinematic Universe.

I rather liked Until Dawn, but I’m not sure how it’s going to translate the things it does well over to a movie adaptation. Where The Last of Us was a linear tale that probably wasn’t too hard to port over to a TV series, Until Dawn lived and died by the choices you made and the various branching plotlines that were possible as a consequence. Like other Supermassive games, it even had a whole section of its UI dedicated to tracking the decisions you’d made and precisely why they were a really bad idea.

Take that away, and you just have a pretty standard horror movie with a decent twist I won’t spoil here. It seems an odd choice to adapt from everything in the Sony catalogue, even if director Sandberg has a record of making horror films like Lights Out and Annabelle: Creation. Then again, they literally made a Gran Turismo movie, so who even knows what’s going on there?

There’s no word on a release date for the Until Dawn movie, but given that it’s only just been announced, we likely have some years to wait.

Related Posts

Getting to market fast, the lean development way

Startups are the darlings of the investment community – and while there are a lot of buzzwords and an occasional lack of vision associated with these companies,…

David Fincher's Crime Thriller Seven Is Finally Getting A 4K Blu-Ray Release

2025 marks the 30th anniversary of the acclaimed investigative thriller Seven. To commemorate the occasion, the movie is getting its first-ever 4K release with a new steelbook…

New Art Book Explores Mortal Kombat's Bloody 30-Year Visual History

More than 30 years ago, Mortal Kombat hit arcades, kicking off the hyper-violent franchise that now spans numerous video games, big-budget movies, comic books, and even an…

Apex Legends Mobile Is Coming Later This Month

Respawn has announced Apex Legends Mobile is headed to both Android and iOS devices later this month. The studio shared the news on the official Apex Legends…

Alec Baldwin Indicted On Federal Charges In Relation To 2021 Shooting Of Rust Cinematographer

Alec Baldwin was indicted by a grand jury today on charges related to the 2021 death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, who was fatally shot by Baldwin during…

Battlefield 4 Review

Now that the review embargo for the Xbox One version of Battlefield 4 has lifted and I’ve spent significant time playing both single- and multiplayer, this update…