Having made the most successful film in A24’s history, Kane Parsons has signed on to direct the horror sequel, Backrooms 2. The above might read like the most obvious headline in film blogging history, given just how much of a hit Backrooms has already been for its studio, A24. The most successful movie in the ... Kane Parsons to make Backrooms 2 next
Having made the most successful film in A24’s history, Kane Parsons has signed on to direct the horror sequel, Backrooms 2.
The above might read like the most obvious headline in film blogging history, given just how much of a hit Backrooms has already been for its studio, A24. The most successful movie in the indie company’s history, it’s made around $400m worldwide on a budget of $10m.
It’s also a technically accomplished debut from director Kane Parsons, who was signed up to adapt his own series of YouTube films while still a teenager and is now aged 20. His 90s-set chiller, about two characters exploring an eerie world between worlds, could have just been another piece of landfill horror based on an internet meme, like 2018’s Slender Man.
Instead, it’s a deceptively smart and melancholy piece that also manages to retain the uncanny feeling of Parsons’ own viral videos. It’s hardly surprising, then, that Parsons has made a Backrooms sequel his next project – Dread Central has the exclusive on this, and writes that an official announcement from A24 will follow soon.
Read more: Backrooms, Mickey Mouse, and stepping outside the emptiness of modernity
What makes the story a little more surprising is that Parsons previously had what sounded like a separate project on the go – a collaboration between he and writer-director Osgood Perkins, of Longlegs and The Monkey fame.
The word in June was that Perkins would write the script and that Parsons would direct it. It now sounds as though that project has been pushed back, and that Backrooms 2 has taken the priority.
The first film left open plenty of threads that could be explored in a sequel, including the secretive company Async; it remains whether Chiwetel Ejiofor and Renate Reinsve will reprise their roles in some form or other.
Understandably, A24 has been keen to keep Kane Parsons from being poached by other studios, with reports emerging over the summer that he’d signed a deal with the company worth $65m. It now looks as though Backrooms 2, rather than an original project, will be his next movie under that deal.
We’ll bring you more on Backrooms 2 as we hear it.
