Leave it to Oz Perkins, the son of “Psycho” star Anthony Perkins, to stir up another cinematic nightmare. The first teaser has been released for Perkins’ so-far-so-mysterious “Longlegs,” out from Neon on July 12, with the director here officially credited as “Osgood Perkins,” also the name of the filmmaker’s grandfather.
The horror movie, which centers on an occult killing spree and one detective’s personal connection to it, stars “It Follows” scream queen Maika Monroe as an FBI agent assigned to a cold case now reawakened. But she soon uncovers a close-to-home link to the crimes, perhaps being orchestrated by Nicolas Cage as the murderer. Blair Underwood and Alicia Witt also star.
Perkins directed his own original screenplay for the Neon release — produced by Cage’s Saturn Pictures, Range, Traffic, Oddfellows, and C2 Motion Picture Group — that shot in Vancouver in early 2023. The marketing so far has been pretty mysterious for this “Silence of the Lambs”-esque thriller that’s said to be a throwback to the great horrors of the 1970s. A set of posters released earlier this week that didn’t tell us much, while an R rating for “bloody violence and disturbing images” certainly promises a grisly affair to come. Andrés Arochi is the cinematographer.
Oz Perkins’ pure-horror output so far has included the films “The Blackcoat’s Daughter” (2015), “I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House” (2016), and “Greta and Hansel” (2020). He also appeared on the Shudder documentary miniseries “Queer for Fear: The History of Queer Horror,” where he discussed his father Anthony’s role in “Psycho” and identity as a closeted gay man playing the mother-obsessed murderer in Alfred Hitchcock’s defining classic.
“Longlegs” star Monroe will reprise her “It Follows” role for the upcoming sequel to the 2014 instant-horror classic, “They Follow,” also set up at Neon. David Robert Mitchell wrote and directed “It Follows” and will reprise the same duties for the follow-up. In that film, Monroe played a high schooler terrorized by a sexually transmitted ghostly entity. She also solidified her scream queen bona fides with the 2022 stalking thriller “Watcher,” released by IFC Midnight.
“You’ve got the teeth of the hydra upon you,” reads the trailer description for “Longlegs.” Watch it below.
