By Justina Bonilla

The Welcome to the Blumhouse series, a VOD collaboration between Blumhouse Television and Amazon Prime Video, has announced the next four films to complete its eight-film TV series. Gigi Saul Guerrero (The Purge (TV Series) , La Quinceañera) and Ryan Zaragoza will each direct one of the four films which will be released in 2021.

The suspenseful thrillers will continue to highlight female and emerging filmmakers, and diverse casts; and will launch next year on Prime Video in over 240 countries and territories worldwide. The “Welcome to the Blumhouse” program continues the legacy of original, elevated, genre storytelling. Centered around unsettling themes of institutional horrors and personal phobias, the films tap into people’s deepest fears. These social thrillers present a distinctive vision and unique perspective.

“Coming off the successful launch of the first four films of the program, which has surpassed our expectations, we are excited to reveal the next chapter coming in 2021,” said Jennifer Salke, Head of Amazon Studios. “The spine-tingling, edge of your seat thrills continues in this next collection of titles that will surely entertain, surprise and shock our global customers.”

The Welcome to the Blumhouse series has hired a wide variety of diverse and emerging talent in front of and behind the camera with their first four horror films Black Box, Nocturne, Evil Eye, and The Lie. Each of these films were original social thrillers, unique to each filmmaker. Behind the camera talent included cinematographers Hilda Mercado and Carmen Cabana who captured the captivating visuals of Black Box and Nocturne respectively.

The Manor, Black as Night, Madres, and Bingo are the next four films in the Blumhouse series. These four films will to be released in 2021. Here is a small peek at these films

The Manor

Axelle Carolyn, Director/Writer

Synopsis: Judith, an elderly woman, is placed in a historic nursing home, after suffering a stroke. Soon, she notices something supernatural impacting her and her fellow nursing home residents. Despite her condition, the only way to escape the unknown supernatural presence, is to persuade those responsible for her care that she is without doubt healthy enough to be discharged.

Cast: Barbara Hershey, Bruce Davison, Nicholas Alexander, Jill Larsen, and Fran Bennett

Black as Night

Maritte Lee Go, Director

Synopsis: During the summer time, in New Orleans, a teenage girl struggling with self-esteem issues, battles vampires, with her best friend, a boy she has a secret crush on. As her self-confidence grows thought her vampire battles, will she ever find the confidence to tell her best friend her feelings for him?

Writer: Sherman Payne; Cast: Fabrizio Guido, Asjha Cooper, Craig Tate, and Keith David.

Madres

Ryan Zaragoza, Director

Synopsis: In 1970s California, a young couple, who are expecting their first child, movie to a migrant farming community. Disturbed by the strange pregnancy symptoms and nightmarish visions, the young mother-to-be investigates to see if what she is experiencing is influenced by a local legendary curse, or something worse.

Writers: Marcella Ochoa & Mario Miscione. Cast: Tenoch Huerta, René Mena Joseph Garcia, Ariana Guerra, Jennifer Patino, Evelyn Gonzalez, Elpidia Carrillo, Composer Geraldo Garcia Jr. and cinematographer Felipe Vara de Rey.

This is Zaragoza’s first feature length film. His previous directorial work includes the short films The Painter, Bebé, and Sterling and TV episodics.

Bingo

Gigi Saul Guerrero, Director

Synopsis: A lively group of elderly friends, led by the spunky and bold Lupita, are fighting against the gentrification of their beloved barrio. However, they face the biggest challenge of their lives, when their treasured Bingo hall is in the process of being sold to a highly influential tenant, more powerful than money.

Written by Shane McKenzie & Guerrero Cast: Not yet announced

Bingo will be Saul Guerrero’s second feature film collaboration as a director and writer for Blumhouse Television. Her first collaboration was with Culture Shock, an episode of the Hulu series Into the Dark. It’s the highest-rated film of the Into the Dark series, on Rotten Tomatoes with a 100% rating.

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By Justina Bonilla

Both Blumhouse Productions and Blumhouse Television are keeping busy with the release of a variety of projects, including two films (The Craft: Legacy and Freaky) and one miniseries (The Good Lord Bird).

Among the vast talents presented in the Blumhouse projects are Latino talents in prominent roles. Each actor shines in their role, adding to the appeal of the ensemble cast of each project.

The Good Lord Bird

Network/Streaming: Showtime and Hulu

Release Date: October 4 to November 15

The episode airing on October 25 of the miniseries The Good Lord Bird, titled Smells like Gorilla, features the introduction of the reoccurring character John Cook, played by actor Rafael Casal. Cook, is introduced during John Brown (Ethan Hawke)’s fundraising mission. He is a member of Brown’s band of misfit, yet loyal rebels. 

Casal is a writer, performer, and producer originally from the San Francisco Bay area. Casal’s first television appearance was performing on three seasons of HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, and is a content creator online, with millions of YouTube/Facebook views for his music, poetry, web shorts, and political commentary. His theater-in-verse work has brought him around the country and the world both in the realm of activism and art performance at hundreds of colleges and venues. Casal is the co-founder and artistic director of the BARS workshop at the Public Theater in New York.

Casal and fellow actor/rapper Daveed Diggs collaborated on the film Blindspotting which released in 2018. The pair wrote, produced, and starred in the film that uses verse to tell the story of their hometown of Oakland. Casal is set to make his directorial debut in First Sight, a sci-fi romantic comedy about falling asleep to find the person of your dreams

The Craft: Legacy

Streaming: Fandango Now, Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, VUDU

Release Date: October 28

The sequel to the classic 1996 film The Craft, directed by writer, producer, and actor Zoe Lister-Jones (New Girl, Life in Pieces, and Whitney). The Craft: Legacy follows four high school girls who create their own witch’s coven. As their newfound powers grow, they grapple to control them. One of the members of this coven is Zoey Luna.

Luna is an up and coming actress and transgender activist, identifying as a transgender Latina. Transitioning at a young age, with support from her mother, Luna was able to share her story as a young TransLatina and the challenges she faced in school, to be respected as the gender she identified with, in the television documentaries The T Word and Raising Zoey.

Later, Luna was featured in the HBO documentary four-part series 15: A Quinceañera Story, documenting the journey to her Quinceañera and what it symbolized to her and her family. From her participation in documentaries, Luna has gone on to appear as an actress in the trailblazing award-winning television program Pose.

Freaky

Release: Limited theatrical release

Release Date: November 13

A unique teen horror comedy, where Freaky Friday meets 1980’s teen slasher. Shy high school student Millie (Kathryn Newton) accidentally through the supernatural switches bodies with a prolific seal killer (Vince Vaughn). Millie, with the help of her friends, must switch back bodies within 24-hours, or else the switch will be permanent. Among the supporting high school classmate roles is Ryler (Melissa Collazo).

Collazo first major acting role was as a recurring character in the popular horror fantasy Netflix series Stranger Things, as a middle school student and gamer. Collazo has also been featured in the CW series Swamp Thing, as the lead character Abby Acrane (Crystal Reed), when she was a teenager.

The post Blumhouse: Highlighting Latino Talent in Upcoming Films first appeared on .

By Justina Bonilla

Blumhouse Television, in collaboration with Amazon Prime Studio, has debuted four new horror films under their Welcome to the Blumhouse banner. Released earlier this month on October 6^th and 13^th, are four supernatural and suspense-filled horror films, including The Lie, Black Box, Nocturne, and Evil Eye.

One of the films is the gothic influenced classic supernatural horror film Nocturne by writer/director Zu Quirke. Nocturne follows twin sisters and classical pianist Vivian (Madison Iseman) and Juliet (Sydney Sweeny). Envious of always being second best to the talent and popularity that comes so easily to Vivian, Juliet finds an unlikely aid in outshining Vivian, in a deceased classmate’s notebook. However, the supernatural powers it poses is beyond anything Juliet could ever have imagined.

Creating the unsettling yet beautiful visuals of Nocturne is Latinx cinematographer Carmen Cabana. In our exclusive interview with Cabana, we discuss her work, Nocturne, and future professional aspirations.   

Cabana is Venezuelan and Colombian. Born in Venezuela, she spent her childhood between both Columbia and Venezuela. Originally she wanted to be a writer, however her talent for storytelling flourished behind the camera. She realized, “Not only do I have a good eye, but I love the collaboration and making the dreams come true for the director.”

At the Art Institute of Los Angeles, Cabana would receive an associate’s degree. To strengthen her cinematography knowledge, “I went nerd”, Cabana joked. She read an array of books, memorized equipment, became a PA (production assistant), and sought out mentorship, some though The ASC (The American Society of Cinematographers).

For Cabana, her first opportunity to display her talents as the lead cinematographer was the Starz television drama series Vida. Vida, created by the show’s creator and showrunner Tanya Saracho, follows two polar opposite Mexican-American sisters, who are reunited in East Los Angeles after the death of their mother. They are forced to deal with the issues between them while re-educating themselves about what a true family is and living back in East Los Angeles.

“[Vida] was a game-changer for me”, Cabana recalled. “I wanted to show the life within the life”. Using vibrant colors and her signature color combinations, she brought to the screen the colors she saw during her exploration of the environment of East Los Angeles and Boyle Heights. Highlighting the beauty of this community, while also showing the candidness of real life. She would bring this knowledge and visual expression to another major series in her career Netflix’s High Fidelity.     

Cabana became interested in working on Nocturne for multiple reasons. Most notably, the story, the artistic direction of the film, and the opportunity to work on a Blumhouse film.

After reading the script for Nocturne, Cabana stated, “I could relate to the point we all desire to be perfect in a certain sense, in what we do, and desire that recognition. It’s just so hard to get.” Further stating, “I felt that it was a different type of horror. It wasn’t horror that was based on boo and blood. Nocturne, it’s actually a slow cooking film, it kind of creeps under your skin.” She also saw how Nocturne, “Kind of like Neon Demon was unsettling in the same way. That it doesn’t really scare you but disturbs you.”

“I wanted to get in with the Blumhouse family because I love all of their movies,” Cabana enthusiastically expressed. “That to me was a dream come true.” She hopes to work on other Blumhouse film productions or Blumhouse Television projects in the future.

On evaluating the script for Nocturne, Cabana realized, “On Nocturne, from the script without having a creative discussion with the director, I felt the influence was on anime, particularly Satoshi Kon.” Kon was a respected Japanese filmmaker within the anime and manga culture, best known for the films Perfect Blue, Tokyo Godfathers, and Paprika.

Two films that influenced the visuals of Nocturne were Raw and Black Swan. Cabana elaborated, “[Raw] sort of had that desaturated look and it had a lot of subjective cameras, where it would show her mental state rather than what the situation is”. She continued, “Black Swan is an adaptation of the Satoshi Kon anime Perfect Blue. Nocturne in a way had that similar element of the character wanting to be more and going to her head, and losing herself.”

In terms of the visuals of Nocturne, Cabana noted, “The director and I, we wanted to use the bleach bypass, which is this saturated look that you saw in the environments. It represents the lackluster of [Juliet’s] life.” Further elaborating, “She was always too close to something, but never able to get there.”

Within the film, some colors are strikingly bold. For example, Juliet’s unicorn pajamas symbolized her desire to be the favorite child and to be seen as unique, rather than as second best to her sister. While “Mozart represented what she wanted to become”, Cabana explained. Blood expressed the negative feelings Juliet has, such as revenge and jealously. Other bright colors sprinkled throughout the film represent the paranormal and the world within Juliet’s mind.

Throughout Nocturne there was also a strong use of shadows. However, a creative challenge for Cabana was utilizing an environment of small spaces and bright walls to create shadows. Cabana shared how, “It had to be very precise and very sharp with the lighting, in order to create that mood”. Emphasizing the importance of shadows, Cabana believes, “Shadows are very important because they represent the things that you hide. And the character was just hiding so much, from the world, from herself.”

Inspired by the influence of her own mentorship, Cabana mentors and teaches because she shared, “I love mentoring, teaching and giving back; helping to build the next generation”. In her spare time Cabana teaches master classes and workshops internationally.“

In March of 2019, Cabana started her own production company Cinecabana. She revealed, “[Cinecabana] so far has invested in writers who are developing stories that I am passionate about telling with female leads and a diverse cast”. Further explaining, “I like [famous Hollywood actor and director] Clint Eastwood’s model with what he has done with Malpaso Productions, so I am slowly growing [Cinecabana]”.

For now, Cinecabana is a company Cabana is funding through her cinematography paychecks. However, she sees the possibility of it growing into, “the bridge between incredible stories and financing”.

With the stunning visuals Cabana has brought to the screen, what we have witness is just the beginning of a marvelous career.

Nocturne is available to stream or buy/rent on Amazon Prime Videos.

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