Sean Parker
Premium horror streaming service Shudder has announced the acquisition of premium streaming rights for supernatural horror film Moloch. Director Nico van den Brink’s directorial debut, an official selection at this year’s Fantasia International Film Festival this July. This is the second film Shudder has picked up ahead of Fantasia, the rights to Rebekah McKendry’s Glorious, starring True Blood’s Ryan Kwanten and Oscar-winning Whiplash star J.K. Simmons.
Moloch is about a woman named Betriek (Blade Runner 2049’s Sallie Harmsen), living on the end of a bog in the northern part of the Netherlands. She and her family are attacked by a stranger one evening and subsequently goes searching for an explanation. The deeper she digs, the more convinced she is that something horrifyingly ancient is hunting her. The film also stars The Wheel of Time’s Alexandre Willaume.
With this announcement also came a Moloch trailer, where you can see Betriek’s involvement with a nearby group of archaeologists, who unearth the remains of a woman with a slit throat. With cultish overtones and rife mythology, the trailer has some serious tension. The ringing of a bell at the dig site intensifying and increasing over the trailer helps raise the stakes. How this folklore, an “ancient family curse,” the triggered seizures of Betriek’s mother, and the discovered remains at an archaeological dig fit together feels like a mystery worth solving. The Moloch trailer breathes comparison to Viy, Schlaf (Sleep), and even Insidious.
Shudder general manager Craig Engler says, “Moloch is a bold and thrilling new folk horror that is sure to chill Shudder members this summer.” Director Nico van den Brink added, “I’m extremely excited to be working with Shudder in bringing Moloch to horror-lovers worldwide. The film will have a wonderful home there. I know we have some very creepy stories to tell in the Netherlands and I’m really looking forward to inviting Shudder’s diverse and international audience into the unique world of local Dutch folklore.”
Moloch haunts your home exclusively on Shudder July 21.
