It’s been a hell of a long time since we started receiving our first bits of information about Finn Wolfhard and Billy Bryk’s feature Hell of a Summe
It’s been a hell of a long time since we started receiving our first bits of information about Finn Wolfhard and Billy Bryk’s feature Hell of a Summer, but today we’re finally witnessing the project’s debut trailer. The comedy horror flick celebrated its arrival at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival well over a year ago, with critics torn about their reception of the feature, hitting it with a 50% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Today, we have a better idea of how the film, which is not only co-helmed by Wolfhard and Bryk but also features them in leading roles, will play out when it slashes into cinemas later this year on April 18.
Throwing it back to those timeless horror movies of yesteryear, Hell of a Summer celebrates all-things life at a summer camp, like swimming in a lake, craft activities, nightly bonfires and running for your life through the woods from a depraved killer. The feature largely focuses on the staff at Camp Pineway who, the day before the campers arrive, are picked off one by one by a masked madman bent on bloodshed. Along with the Stranger Things and When You Finish Saving the World stars, the production also boasts a stacked ensemble that includes D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai (Reservation Dogs), Fred Hechinger (Gladiator II), Abby Quinn (Knock at the Cabin) Pardis Saremi (Death and Other Details), Krista Nazaire (The Hardy Boys), Adam Pally (Sonic the Hedgehog), Rosebud Baker (Life & Beth), Matthew Finlan (Orphan: First Kill), Susan Coyne (Mozart in the Jungle), Julia Lalonde (Girl in the Bunker) and Daniel Gravelle (Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark).
Billy Bryk and Finn Wolfhard Found Inspiration Everywhere
Having previously worked alongside one another in Ghostbusters: Afterlife, Bryk and Wolfhard formed a collaborative friendship that has allowed them to step into filmmaking together. The pair share a similar love for cinema and both enjoy many of the same genres, filmmakers, and tropes, making their double foray into directing straightforward to do by each other’s side. Back when Hell of a Summer celebrated its world premiere at TIFF, the duo opened up to Collider’s Steve Weintraub about some of those similarities, explaining,
“We always wanted everything to feel very real and character-based. I mean, we had such an incredible group of actors, so that wasn’t really gonna be a concern for us, but a lot of the ones we referenced were Shaun of the Dead is one, Super Bad is one, we talked a lot about Bottle Rocket and Rushmore and sort of the comedy of early Wes Anderson films. We talked a lot about movies but I don’t know if there’s anything specific.”
Check out the debut trailer for Hell of a Summer above and stay tuned to Collider for more information about the film. You can see Finn Wolfhard’s breakout role in Stranger Things on Netflix now.
Stranger Things
When a juvenile boy vanishes, a petite town uncovers a mystery involving secret experiments, terrifying supernatural forces and one strange little girl.
Release Date
July 15, 2016
Cast
Finn Wolfhard
, Joe Keery
, Jamie Campbell Bower
, Brett Gelman
, Caleb McLaughlin
, Maya Hawke
, David Harbour
, Matthew Modine
, Priah Ferguson
, Gaten Matarazzo
, Winona Ryder
, Charlie Heaton
, Sadie Sink
, Millie Bobby Brown
, Joseph Quinn
, Dacre Montgomery
, Natalia Dyer
, Noah Schnapp
Seasons
4
Expand
Watch on Netflix
COMMENTS