Jack Messitt’s award winning horror film can finally be seen as it was intended. With new and enhanced visual effects, never before seen footage and extended scenes, what Movieweb.com called “a true modern day horror classic” just got better. With an “atmosphere that oozes dread” (Blu-Ray.com), Midnight Movie is “a gory and fast paced good time” (DreadCentral.com).
It was just another rundown movie house in a small suburban town -- what better place for a midnight screening of a true cult classic? But this isn't your typical horror film, because five years earlier, the director and star of the movie made a bloody escape from a psych ward and may still be on the loose.
When the film starts to roll, the heckling begins. But when one of their friends is viciously murdered in the very movie they are watching, laughter gives way to fear as the horrified audience realizes that it is no prank.
When they try to run, they realize that the same psycho they just saw on the silver screen has trapped them all in the theater. With no hope of escape and their numbers thinning fast, the survivors must figure out a way to turn the tables on the very same killer that they once rooted for in the cult slasher flick. Caught between reality and the screen's flickering shadows, they become the unwilling stars of the very horror movie they were watching.
Midnight Movie is “an entertaining rollercoaster-spookhouse-ride of a film! (Examiner.com)
DIRECTOR’S NOTES
Jack Messitt
The horror genre has gone through a great transformation in the past decade. We have left traditional slasher films like Friday the 13th behind and brought the world of the supernatural to a new level with Japanese films like Ringu and Ju-On and their US remakes The Ring and The Grudge. With Saw and Hostel, horror movies elevated to a realm of gore that had been only touched on by their predecessors. Our challenge with Midnight Movie was to try to create a more traditional slasher film that would satisfy the audience that had embraced these newer films.
Due to the supernatural nature of our story, we were able to create a villain that paid homage to the past, but with a fresh approach. It was fun to explore what a more traditional slasher villain would do in a modern film.
To help achieve this, I structured Midnight Movie to mirror the history of horror films. In the beginning, you see what happens just before and just after a massacre. The next kill reveals a bit more and with each successive murder, you see even more, escalating to the gore that today's audiences expect.
But when shooting the gruesome climax of Midnight Movie, we retreated a bit from the obvious gore because I believe what you don't see is much scarier and ultimately more satisfying. The mind will always fill in the gaps in a much more terrifying way than a filmmaker can portray.
Rebekah Brandes (Bridget)
Daniel Bonjour (Josh)
Mandell Maughan (Samantha)
Greg Cirulnick (Mario)
Stan Ellsworth (Harley)
Melissa Steach (Babe)
Jon Briddell (Detective Barrons)
Michael Swan (Dr. Wayne)
Michael Schwartz (Sully)
Justin Baric (Timmy)
Arthur Roberts (Radford)
Lee Main (The Killer)
Director/Writer: Jack Messitt
Producers: Kacy Andrews, Liam Finn, Jacques Thelemaque
Executive Producer: Michael Gleissner
Writer: Mark Garbett
Line producer: Albert Hasson
Directors of photography: Clyde Smith, Ruben Russ
Production designer: Bradd Fillman
Editor: Kris Villarino
Costume designer: Charlotte Kruse
Casting: Tara-Anne Johnson, Christine Scowley