It’s John Cho versus technology again in Afraid. Here’s the trailer for Blumhouse’s latest high-tech horror flick.
John Cho is no stranger to grappling with technology in high-stakes scenarios. Cho was the star of 2018’s Searching, one of the most successful film’s in the screenlife format. That film took place within the confines of a laptop screen, and throughout its runtime we saw Cho play a terrified parent grappling with his missing daughter’s laptop as he raced against time to uncover its hidden secrets and find out where she was. The film spawned a sequel (that Cho was not part of) called Missing, which released last year.
Having taken on the might of a Macbook, Cho is returning to duel with technology once again, this time in Afraid. Blumhouse Productions and Sony Pictures have released the trailer for the film, which sees Cho and his family having to take on a very sinister smart speaker. Here’s the synopsis:
‘Cho’s Curtis and his family are selected to test a revolutionary new home device: a digital family assistant called AIA. Taking smart home to the next level, once the unit and all its sensors and cameras are installed in their home, AIA seems able to do it all. She learns the family’s behaviors and begins to anticipate their needs. Soon she starts to overstep her boundaries, from bribing the children to wiping the internet of a leaked private video. As things escalate, she makes sure that nothing – and no one – gets in her family’s way.’
Horror films have always tapped into modern fears, and the rise of smart speakers is a particularly current topic. Afraid looks set to leverage those concerns when it releases at the end of August. By the looks of things, it’d make a solid double-bill with Blumhouse’s other recent tech horror, M3gan.
Katherine Waterston, Havana Rose Liu, Lukita Maxwell, David Dastmalchian, and Keith Carradine co- star in the film which has been written and helmed by Chris Weitz.
Here’s that trailer below.