Movies
Autonomy Pictures Comes Out Playing ‘The Bunny Game’
When we last heard any news about Adam Rehmeier’s The Bunny Game, it had been rejected for home video release by the BBFC who stated, “It is the Board’s carefully considered view that to issue a certificate to this work, even if confined to adults, would be inconsistent with the Board’s Guidelines, would risk potential harm within the terms of the Video Recordings Act, and would accordingly be unacceptable to the public.”
Rehmeier responded to Bloody Disgusting at the time stating: “I think ‘The Bunny Game’ is way less disturbing than ‘Pretty Woman’. Somehow it’s more socially acceptable to glamorize prostitution under the guise of a rags-to-riches fairy tale where Richard Gere falls in love with the whore by the end of the film.” He continues, “Rodleen and I didn’t make ‘The Bunny Game’ to glamorize prostitution. It is far from an erotic film. It is a modern cautionary tale grounded in reality.”
The film was eventually released in the UK and will hit the US in July from new distributor Autonomy, who will make the film their first release. Per Screen Daily, “Derek Curl, David Gregory and Lewis Tice’s new distributor aims to release “uncompromising cinema on a worldwide scale” and will handle four films this year, starting with Adam Rehmeier’s torture porn. “‘The Bunny Game’ is the last word on the torture-porn sub-genre,” Autonomy president Curl said. “I was shocked by its audacity and the raw honesty that it depicted, making me question our collective enjoyment of extreme violence in cinema. At Autonomy Pictures we are not afraid to release such a film, which will undoubtedly inspire heated reaction, because it will allow audiences to make up their own minds.”
Bunny Games follows a female prostitute (Rodleen Getsic) who hitches a lift with a truck driver. The truck driver (Jeff Renfro) kidnaps the woman, restrains and forcibly strips her, and proceeds to physically and sexually abuse and humiliate her.
Julian Richards negotiated the deal on behalf of the filmmakers, ““It’s great to see the launch of the new genre label Autonomy Pictures. And I think that the acquisition of Adam Rehmeier’s uber-controversial The Bunny Game is a bold statement of intent.”
A contemporary reimagining of H.P. Lovecraft’s short story Herbert West: Reanimator is on the way, and Deadline has unveiled the first look at the new Herbert West and the pathologist drawn to his orbit.
The original screenplay and storyline come from Jade Sandberg Wallis.
Michael Grossman (“The Originals”, “Pretty Little Liars”) directs.
The new images introduce star Joseph Morgan (“Vampire Diaries“), who plays “brilliant surgeon and scientist Herbert West, who is obsessed with creating a serum to reanimate the dead.” Katie Cassidy (Speed Demon) stars opposite as the pathologist with a troubled past who joins his efforts.
Together, they prove that conquering death may be the ultimate sin against life itself.
The film’s official synopsis: “As a child, Herbert West watches his father Peter reanimate his dead mother Judith in a secret basement lab — only for Judith to mortally wound Peter and nearly kill Herbert before Peter shoots her. The trauma leaves its mark on Herbert, but so does one final image: his mother’s finger, twitching after death. Thirty years later, Herbert West is a brilliant, secretive surgeon still chasing his father’s obsession.
“Pathologist Kate Locke arrives in town and is drawn into his orbit — first through a spark at a hospital fundraiser, then through his secret lab, where he reveals a serum capable of reanimating severed tissue. Kate, hiding a dark past of her own, is thrilled rather than horrified, and moves into West’s mansion to work alongside him. Their early experiments on a cadaver succeed only briefly. West concludes that dead tissue is the problem — they need something fresher.”
Supporting cast includes Scott Aiello, Ira J Amyx, Randall Newsome, Emma Reinagal, James D. Bryce, Kathryn A Bentley, Jack Lancaster, Amy Holland Pennell, John Pierson, Mindy Shaw, Eric Dean White, Tristan Wilder Hallet, Adrienne Lamping, Aaron Crippen, and Drew Patterson.
Makeup artist Jeff Lewis (“Star Trek: Voyager,” “Star Trek: Enterprise”) and cousin Roger Lewis are heading the production via their newly established Woodlake Entertainment.
Lovecraft’s short story, first serialized in Home Brew magazine in 1922, is the first among his works to mention the fictional Miskatonic University. It was most famously adapted into a 1985 horror movie from Stuart Gordon, starring Jeffrey Combs as Herbert West.
Herbert West: Reanimator is set in Alton, Illinois, where production is now underway.
Herbert West: Reanimator. Photo credit: Matt Lief Anderson
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