Up-and-coming director Caleb Phillips has signed with Underground, a company that has become a hit thanks to the box office success of its client Carrie Parker. mania.
The move comes after the premiere of Phillips’ cosmic horror film South by Southwest Scammersearning an early Rotten Tomatoes critics score of 93 percent from the festival’s Midnighter section and generating interest among potential buyers.
Phillips wrote and directed this kind of twist Scammerswhich stars Jessica Rothe as a mother desperate to get her little boy back after he’s kidnapped. When she learns a way to bring her son home, her husband (Charlie Barnett) begins to suspect that the returned child is not really theirs.
Phillips first made waves with his short shorts The other side of the boxWhich received more than 30 million views on YouTube and revolved around a couple who were given a mysterious box, with disastrous and terrifying results. This quality seems more important than ever in the wake of Ken Parsons’ huge success Back roomswhich began as a series of popular YouTube shorts and broke A24 records last weekend.
Phillips followed with the stunning short story play with me, About a woman who wakes up in a car with no memory and discovers a man tied up in the back, and a voice recorder with the note: “Play with me.”
to ScammersPhillips teamed with producers Thomas Bond, Sarah Seligman and Joe Bandelli, with Blue Finch Films distributing it internationally. The cast also includes Yul Vasquez, Bates Wilder, Luisina Quarleri, Tomas Paroubek, Ian Lyons, Taylor Karen, Lee Bennett and Declan Bennett.
Phillips is a graduate of the Los Angeles Film School who broke into directing while working as a crew member on several projects.
Director Aaron Volpe and Underground director Trevor Engelson will star in the film.
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