Last Updated on September 13, 2024 by Angel Melanson
Credit where credit is due, director Damien Leone is sticking to his guns with the Terrifier franchise. This ultra-bloodly, mega-gory slasher series is his baby, dating back to the 2008 short The 9th Circle that introduced us to Art the Clown. The carnage will continue next month when Terrifier 3 hits theaters. It turns out, at least one Hollywood studio saw the value in what Leone has created and they wanted him to do a remake for the masses. Leone, however, wasn’t interested in toning things down.
Leone recently spoke to the folks at Total Film in anticipation of the release of Terrifier 3. During the conversation, the filmmaker explained that he was approached by a studio that shall not be named about a remake of 2016’s Terrifier, one that could manage an R rating so that it could be marketed a bit more easily. Here’s what Leone had to say about it:
“They wanted to reboot it for a wider audience. That’s not what I was interested in. They would say, ‘It’s gotta be rated R, it can’t be as gory as you made it.’”
Unquestionably, things have only gotten further and further away from a mainstream R rating as the franchise has gone one. Terrifier 2, which was a very big surprise hit in 2022, was well over two hours of punishing gore. Apparently, it’s only going to get even more gory in the third installment. “I knew they’d never let me shoot the first 10 minutes of what I wanted to do [in Terrifier 3],” Leone said of the unnamed studio. “So I thought, ‘Let’s just stay true to what this franchise is.'”
Art the Clown has since become a true modern horror icon thanks to the Terrifier franchise. It’s made all the more impressive given that Leon has made Terrifier 2 with a budget of just $250,000. “They were so curious as to what I did with so little money,” the filmmaker added of his conversation with the studio. So, what’s Art getting up to this time around? Here is the synopsis for Terrifier 3:
“Art the Clown (David Howard Thornton) is set to unleash another round of chaos on the unsuspecting residents of Miles County as they peacefully drift off to sleep on Christmas Eve.”
The cast for the upcoming sequel also includes Samantha Scaffadi as Victoria Heyes and Elliot Fullam as Jonathan, with Jason Patric (The Lost Boys), wrestler Chris Jericho, Daniel Roebuck (Halloween), Clint Howard (Ice Cream Man) and visual effects icon Tom Savini.
Terrifier 3 is set to hit theaters on October 11. For more, check out Cinemark’s new Terrifier 3 popcorn bucket.
