Movies
Edward Furlong’s ‘Below Zero’ Has A Trailer, No Longer Called ‘Below Zero 3D’
If you’re wondering what Edward Furlong (Night of the Demons, Terminator 2, Crow: Wicked Prayer) has been up to aside from appearing in The Green Hornet, you can now see the trailer for Justin Thomas Ostensen’s Below Zero. Which has apparently dropped the “3D” from it’s name. Which is fine by me, no reason a film set in this small of a space should also be in 3D.
The film also stars Michael Berryman and was penned by Signe Olynyk. According to the filmmakers, “‘Below Zero is the true-life story of Jack the Hack, a screenwriter with writer’s block who arranges to have himself locked in a meat cooler in order to meet a looming deadline. As the temperature drops, the lines between reality and fiction blur, and Jack’s story comes to life, exposing him to a world of horror that only a meat freezer can inspire.”
That’s not entirely true. The screenwriter came up with the idea and locker herself in a freezer to write the script. Whatever it takes I guess!
Hit the jump to check out the trailer.
The trailer for Ti West’s upcoming adaptation of A Christmas Carol raised a lot of eyebrows when it dropped earlier this week. While plenty of folks initially dismissed Ebenezer as a derivative project meant to cash in on the recent wave of unnecessary prequels that expand the backstory of beloved characters (such as 2023’s Wonka), Charles Dickens’ original novel already made a point of exploring Ebenezer Scrooge’s origins in detail – meaning that this new film is likely just a particularly faithful adaptation of the source material under a different name.
Couple that with the fact that the movie is being helmed by a genuine horror auteur and I think it’s safe to say that the latest iteration of the first modern ghost story is in good hands.
That being said, one detail that immediately jumped out at me during the brief teaser (other than a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it nod to Johnny Depp’s iconic bedroom death scene from the original A Nightmare on Elm Street) is the fact that many of Ebenezer’s ghosts appear to have been directly lifted from the iconic John Leech illustrations that accompanied the first edition of Dickens’ novel.
Here are a couple of stills from the trailer compared to the original artwork:
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come in ‘Ebenezer’ and ‘A Christmas Carol’
The Phantoms in ‘A Christmas Carol’ and ‘Ebenezer’
Marley’s Ghost in ‘Ebenezer’ and ‘A Christmas Carol’
Mainly working with old-school wood and steel engravings that would later be transferred to print, Leech was instrumental in crafting the iconic look of history’s most influential phantoms – especially since Dickens is said to have been deeply involved with the creation of these so-called “comic illustrations.”
And since the novel is commonly said to have popularized spiritualism in Victorian England, much of the ghostly iconography that we still see in genre media to this very day (including some of Ti West’s previous films) can be traced back to the author’s partnership with Leech.
Ebenezer won’t be the first A Christmas Carol adaptation to borrow heavily from these designs, but I can appreciate how Ti West is incorporating an important part of horror history into his latest film.
Ebenezer will be available in theaters starting November 13.
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