Latest news with #LeighWhannell
Daily Mail
4 days ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
Aussie Saw filmmaker James Wan shares his heartbreak after legendary producer who helped him get his big break dies aged 55
Australian filmmaker James Wan has paid tribute to beloved Saw movie producer Jason Constantine who died aged 55 on Tuesday from brain cancer. The horror director, 48, who worked on most of the Saw movies with Constantine, posted several photos of the pair together as he shared his heartbreak. 'We lost a truly great friend and human being in Jason. I've known Jason since we first came out here to make Saw. That movie is what it is today because of him,' he wrote. 'He believed in the project so much, they brought it to Lionsgate and championed it before the movie was even shot.' Wan went on to thank his late friend for helping him transform what began as a student film into a billion dollar franchise. From A-list scandals and red carpet mishaps to exclusive pictures and viral moments, subscribe to the DailyMail's new showbiz newsletter to stay in the loop. 'Jason was an unsung hero of the franchise, a constant avid supporter of the movies and the filmmakers involved,' he added. 'But more importantly, he was a genuinely kind, sweet, caring, loving man. 'A true anomaly in a town like Hollywood. And a great father and husband too.' After Constantine helped him to break into the industry, Wan went on to direct many acclaimed Hollywood blockbusters, including Fast and Furious 7 and The Conjuring. Constantine was co-president of Lionsgate Motion Picture Group and executive producer of all ten Saw movies, created by Wan and his writing partner Leigh Whannell. He also produced the Australian-filmed US movies See No Evil, starring Rachael Taylor, and The Condemned featuring Neighbours actress Madeleine West. The producer died at his Los Angeles home on Tuesday after a long battle with brain cancer. Across ten movies made from 2004 - 2023, the Saw franchise has made over AU$1bn at the box office. Wan went on to thank his late friend for helping him transform what began as a student film into a billion dollar franchise In addition to a mostly American cast, the films featured Australian actor Costas Mandylor as a villainous detective. The franchise kicked off with Saw, which hit theatres October 27, 2004, and helped put director Wan and writer Whannell on the map. The first film was produced on a modest budget and made over $100m at the box office, sparking an iconic franchise. Saw II followed just a year later, with Darren Lynn Bousman replacing Wan at the helm and co-writing the script with Whannell. The most recent movie movie, Saw X, was released in 2023 and was produced by both Wan and Constantine.
Gizmodo
02-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Gizmodo
James Wan's Ventriloquist Horror Flick Is Ready to Be Rediscovered
It's not the frightfest it was intended to be, but 'Dead Silence' is an entertaining foreshadowing of the director's later successes. In 2007, James Wan was a horror up-and-comer who'd scored a huge hit with 2004's Saw, which had by then already released its first two sequels with a third on the way. But before Insidious and The Conjuring he made a couple of one-offs: the Kevin Bacon vigilante thriller Death Sentence, and the ventriloquist horror tale Dead Silence. The latter was just added to Shudder, and though it was a bust 18 years ago, it's now a fun one to revisit—especially taking into account all that Wan and his frequent collaborator Leigh Whannell, who scripted Dead Silence, have accomplished since then. Though they were still just the Saw guys at the time, you can easily pick out certain narrative choices and imagery that would later become touchstones of their work. Saw's game-obsessed Jigsaw puppet was already entered into the record ahead of Dead Silence, and it's echoed here in Billy, the main ventriloquist dummy in a movie that gives him a lot of evil toy back-ups. The white face, the ghoulishly hinged jaw, and the fondness for bow ties are all shared characteristics, though Billy has luminous blue eyes that peer around in sinister ways the audience notices far before the characters do. Wan is notably a huge fan of cursed objects; the Conjuring cinematic universe is built around them. It can't be a coincidence that Annabelle—a doll even more ghastly than Billy—is the most charismatic escapee from Ed and Lorraine Warren's stash of occult treasures. (Wan's Instagram handle? 'Creepypuppet'.) Dead Silence also hints at stylistic elements that would enter Wan's later work, with eerie sound design that plays up silence as much as shrieks, as well as jump scares that predate the furious old-lady entity in Insidious, as well as the Nun's fondness for dramatically emerging from the shadows… then contorting her face to bring out her demonic side. You also can't ignore the fact that Saw mainstay Donnie Wahlberg is also in Dead Silence, playing a familiar sort of scruffy police detective. This version of the character is more skeptical than the corrupt cop in Saw; he's fond of issuing warnings like 'You don't want to make me chase you!' as he races after the protagonist into an abandoned theater full of haunted dolls. He also has a weird obsession with his battery-operated razor, a tic that leads nowhere despite being foregrounded as a key personality trait. Dead Silence's set-up also hints at Wan supernatural stories to come, with a malevolent figure in the past poking its way across generations to make sure a curse never dies. Unfortunately the main character, Jamie—Ryan Kwanten, just prior to True Blood—isn't as compelling as the central figures in Insidious or The Conjuring. He's just sort of an unmemorable dude, though he is a determined one. When his wife dies in an absolutely hideous way—the very night a ventriloquist dummy is delivered to their apartment from an unknown sender—he heads straight to his hometown, where his estranged father (Bob Gunton) lives with his suspiciously young and glamorous new wife (Amber Valletta). Though Dead Silence takes place in 2007, it's set in a reality seemingly devoid of cell phones and Google searches. There are land lines galore, and historical exposition comes courtesy of a mortician's extended flashback as well as a literal scrapbook that Jamie happens to come across. There's also a nursery rhyme that references the town's boogeyman figure: a theater performer named Mary Shaw so obsessed with the dolls in her act she insisted they be buried with her… each with their own tiny coffin and grave marker. There's even more to the backstory that surfaces as Jamie digs deeper—including a decades-old cold case involving a missing child, and an extended bit about tongues being ripped out that seems like it should tie into the 'throwing your voice' part of ventriloquism, but the details don't quite come together there. Still, 'Be careful! If you go looking for answers, you just might find them' is the advice the mortician passes on to Jamie (naturally, he never even considers abiding by that), and Dead Silence agreeably ties up most of its plot threads by the end. It also has an absolute scream of a twist ending that makes you think perhaps, just maybe, Wan and Whannell had campier ambitions for this story. As it plays out onscreen, Dead Silence skews a little too much toward taking itself too seriously, especially considering the sheer amount of dolls involved. It's also filmed with a relentlessly dour blue-tinged filter, which is maybe the greatest sin committed here, as well as what marks it so clearly as a mid-2000s relic. If you don't mind turning up the brightness to ease that gloom, though, you can have a jolly good time watching this one. Don't be surprised if you have the urge to watch a few more Wan flicks once you're done. Dead Silence is now streaming on Shudder.
Forbes
27-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
Horror Thriller ‘Wolf Man' Gets Peacock Streaming Premiere Date
"Wolf Man" partial poster. Universal Pictures Wolf Man — a modern reimaging of the classic Lon Chaney Jr. Universal Studios monster movie — is coming soon to Peacock. Rated R, Wolf Man opened in theaters on Jan. 17 and made its debut on digital streaming via premium video on demand on Feb. 4. The official logline for Wolf Man reads, 'A family at a remote farmhouse is attacked by an unseen animal, but as the night stretches on, the father begins to transform into something unrecognizable.' Christopher Abbott (Kraven the Hunter) and Julia Garner (Ozark) star in Wolf Man as Charlotte and Blake, and Matilda Firth plays their daughter, Ginger. Wolf Man is directed and co-written by Leigh Whannell, who previously wrote and directed the hit reimagining of the classic Universal Studios monster movie The Invisible Man in 2020. According to When to Stream, Wolf Man will arrive on streaming on Peacock on Friday, April 18. You must be a subscriber to the NBC Universal streaming platform to watch Wolf Man on Peacock. Peacock has an ad-based package for $7.99 per month or $79 per year, as well as an ad-free package for $13.99 per month or $139.99 yearly. While Wolf Man's roots date back to the classic 1941 Universal Monsters film The Wolf Man, director Leigh Whannell told the British Film Institute that his new version of the classic tale is actually a tribute to the horror films of the 1980s and the use of practical effects of the makeup artists of the day. 'As a horror fan, I've grown up obsessed with prosthetic make-up effects, and these guys who are the masters of that – Stan Winston, Rick Baker, Rob Bottin and Dick Smith – they're like rock stars to me,' Whannell told BFI. 'I was reading Fangoria, looking at these people as absolute heroes. I grew up in that era where those effects stood out in your mind.' Whannell, whose producer credits include nine movies in the Saw horror movie franchise (including spinoffs), told BFI that Wolf Man is the first movie he made that 'relied so heavily on prosthetic make-up effects and special effects make-up.' 'It's really a tribute to those films that exemplify the best of the make-up – The Thing (1982), An American Werewolf in London (1981), The Exorcist (1973),' Whannell explained to BFI. Per The Numbers, Wolf Man has earned $20.7 million in North American ticket sales and $14.1 million internationally for a worldwide box office gross of $34.6 million. Variety reported that Wolf Man had a production budget of $25 million before prints and advertising costs. Rotten Tomatoes critics collectively gave Wolf Man a 50% 'rotten' rating based on 252 reviews, while audiences gave the film a 56% 'rotten' rating on RT's Popcornmeter based on 1,000-plus verified user ratings. Wolf Man arrives on Peacock on April 18.
