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The Sound Design of ‘Layers of Fear 2’ Is a Devil of its Own

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Layers

Binaural frequencies are sometimes the marrow of what makes you spill your popcorn at the cinema. That very artful use of layers of sounds and paint flicks of frequency are exactly what is behind the most impressive and terrifying bits of Gun Media’s Layers of Fear 2.

Layers of Fear 2 follows extremely method actor tasked by a complete auteur director to research, and to find, his character aboard a gigantic ocean liner.

Get a look at our full review here.

This sort of auditory alchemy has been used in a variety of ways over the years. Most notably, 2007’s Paranormal Activity raised the bar by subtlety sprinkling in pulse raising binaural elements to great affect. If you go back and watch, you will notice a strange low frequency hum that plays whenever the entity begins terrorizing the unfortunate couple. It was a brilliant and groundbreaking, not necessarily because these methods hadn’t been used before, but because Paranormal Activity is devoid of a musical score. Instead, you get these tense scenes with that harrowing hum.

Unknown to most, the film was using actual tones to affect mood and heart rate. Add that to some terrifying shit befalling a unsuspecting couple, and you had fried horror gold.

Sound Designer, Brunon Lubas incorporated a ton of low-fi tech to achieve the creepy whirlwind that paints the walls of Layers of Fear 2. This even extended to using analogue cassette tapes and a variety of hand crafted sounds.

The approach also leads to the mystically terrifying world of binaural frequencies.

Binaural’s have a wide range of uses, and can literally control aspects of mood when played at varying frequencies. These waves include delta, theta, alpha, beta and gamma. Each control everything from sleep, relaxation, high level cognition and peak awareness. Some folks use these tones to help them sleep or to relax, but we aren’t here to talk about that stuff. Masters of the jump scare of found ways to use these tones against us and to ultimately scare the shit out of us.

Layers of Fear 2 creates some rather effective jump scares out of auditory beats alone. Since so much of the game (especially at its beginning) is less things you can see and more things you can hear, the use of binaural artistry goes to work immediately.

Right from the beginning, the game advises using headphones. I couldn’t agree more with this suggestion, to the point of it almost being a necessity. The sound design really swirls, lives and breathes around you in those moments and is incredibly intensified through the use of a good pair of headphones.

Binaurals really are the gravy of horror and Layers of Fear 2 piles it on thick, placing you in tense spot where a simple wine bottle rolling across the floor paired with the right audio cue and a stinging controller vibration is enough to make you jump right out of your seat.

Layers of Fear 2 is out now on PC, PS4 and Xbox One.

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‘Evil Dead’ Film Franchise Getting TWO New Installments

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It was a risk for Fede Alvarez to reboot Sam Raimi’s horror classic The Evil Dead in 2013, but that risk paid off and so did its spiritual sequel Evil Dead Rise in 2023. Now Deadline is reporting that the series is getting, not one, but two fresh entries.

We already knew about the Sébastien Vaniček upcoming film that delves into the Deadite universe and should be a proper sequel to the latest film, but we are broadsided that Francis Galluppi and Ghost House Pictures are doing a one-off project set in Raimi’s universe based off of an idea that Galluppi pitched to Raimi himself. That concept is being kept under wraps.

Evil Dead Rise

“Francis Galluppi is a storyteller who knows when to keep us waiting in simmering tension and when to hit us with explosive violence,” Raimi told Deadline. “He is a director that shows uncommon control in his feature debut.”

That feature is titled The Last Stop In Yuma County which will release theatrically in the United States on May 4. It follows a traveling salesman, “stranded at a rural Arizona rest stop,” and “is thrust into a dire hostage situation by the arrival of two bank robbers with no qualms about using cruelty-or cold, hard steel-to protect their bloodstained fortune.”

Galluppi is an award-winning sci-fi/horror shorts director whose acclaimed works include High Desert Hell and The Gemini Project. You can view the full edit of High Desert Hell and the teaser for Gemini below:

High Desert Hell
The Gemini Project

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‘Invisible Man 2’ Is “Closer Than Its Ever Been” to Happening

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Elisabeth Moss in a very well-thought-out statement said in an interview for Happy Sad Confused that even though there have been some logistical issues for doing Invisible Man 2 there is hope on the horizon.

Podcast host Josh Horowitz asked about the follow-up and if Moss and director Leigh Whannell were any closer to cracking a solution to getting it made. “We are closer than we have ever been to cracking it,” said Moss with a huge grin. You can see her reaction at the 35:52 mark in the below video.

Happy Sad Confused

Whannell is currently in New Zealand filming another monster movie for Universal, Wolf Man, which might be the spark that ignites Universal’s troubled Dark Universe concept which hasn’t gained any momentum since Tom Cruise’s failed attempt at resurrecting The Mummy.

Also, in the podcast video, Moss says she is not in the Wolf Man film so any speculation that it’s a crossover project is left in the air.

Meanwhile, Universal Studios is in the middle of constructing a year-round haunt house in Las Vegas which will showcase some of their classic cinematic monsters. Depending on attendance, this could be the boost the studio needs to get audiences interested in their creature IPs once more and to get more films made based on them.

The Las Vegas project is set to open in 2025, coinciding with their new proper theme park in Orlando called Epic Universe.

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Jake Gyllenhaal’s Thriller ‘Presumed Innocent’ Series Gets Early Release Date

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Jake gyllenhaal presumed innocent

Jake Gyllenhaal’s limited series Presumed Innocent is dropping on AppleTV+ on June 12 instead of June 14 as originally planned. The star, whose Road House reboot has brought mixed reviews on Amazon Prime, is embracing the small screen for the first time since his appearance on Homicide: Life on the Street in 1994.

Jake Gyllenhaal’s in ‘Presumed Innocent’

Presumed Innocent is being produced by David E. Kelley, J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot, and Warner Bros. It is an adaptation of Scott Turow’s 1990 film in which Harrison Ford plays a lawyer doing double duty as an investigator looking for the murderer of his colleague.

These types of sexy thrillers were popular in the ’90s and usually contained twist endings. Here’s the trailer for the original:

According to Deadline, Presumed Innocent doesn’t stray far from the source material: “…the Presumed Innocent series will explore obsession, sex, politics and the power and limits of love as the accused fights to hold his family and marriage together.”

Up next for Gyllenhaal is the Guy Ritchie action movie titled In the Grey scheduled for release in January 2025.

Presumed Innocent is an eight-episode limited series set to stream on AppleTV+ starting June 12.

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