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‘Escape Room: Tournament of Champions’: BTS with Holland Roden & Logan Miller

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Escape Room: Tournament of Champions

The premiere of Escape Room: Tournament of Champions is almost here! The sequel to 2019’s hit action-thriller will finally hit the big screen this Friday, July 16, 2021, and with it comes a whole new set of deadly escape rooms created by the terrifying Minos Corporation.

The follow-up film sees the return of director Adam Robitel along with stars Taylor Russell and Logan Miller joined by all-new competitors with Holland Roden, Indya Moore, Thomas Cocquerel, and Carlito Olivero.

Ahead of the film’s release Miller and Roden sat down with iHorror to talk about the new film, what they hope fans will enjoy, and the joys of stepping back into a theater after a year of pandemic isolation.

“You know, I was so tired of not getting tortured so I thought I would go back in and experience it again,” Miller joked about his return for the sequel. “Seriously, though, we were so thankful that we got such a great response from the first one that we wanted to put our heads together and try to make it all the greater and all the more fun for the audience. I really do feel like we accomplished that. This one is two times the grand scale and it’s a lot more fun. The first one, it was slow to get into the world of it. With this one, you just jump right in.”

For Roden, however, this wasn’t only the start of something new, but Escape Room: Tournament of Champions was filmmaking on a scale that she’d never really experienced in her career.

“I’ve never been part of a production this big,” she explained. “I was a TV gal and I’ve done a few smaller movies. I watched the first movie when I was getting ready for the audition. I love games and escape rooms myself. It’s such a fun movie, and I love that it’s like a psychological thriller and an amusement park and a horror movie. It’s the whole package. So I was super excited.”

The actress, a self-proclaimed set geek, loved working in the elaborate world of Escape Room, especially considering most of the sets were practical and “real.” Both she and Miller admit to having favorite set-pieces and locations on the shoot.

“You could argue that the set is the main character,” she pointed out. “My favorite was probably the crab shack. They built this Truman Show of a beach set that had the full horizon stop. I love that and I love that the hydraulics on the crab shack actually moved. Like Logan said, the practicals on this movie are incredible. It really felt like the shack was sinking because it actually kind of does.”

“I was really blown away by the subway set they created,” Miller added. “It really was a 360 working subway set that was on all these machines that made everything move properly. Even though we were shooting in South Africa, I felt like we were on Canal Street getting on the Q train. We don’t have to play to a tennis ball on a green screen. We get to experience this stuff. The cool thing is that there’s such minute detail in every single room. These are actually working escape rooms. It’s crazy!”

Escape Room: Tournament of Champions has been tossed around by the pandemic shuffle with a release date in such constant flux that even now it’s hard to believe we’re finally going to see it in theaters. That wait has seemed twice as long for the actors who finished filming in January 2020 only to find themselves in lockdown a month later.

The path back to the big screen has been a rough one of fits and starts. With films like the recent Black Widow drawing in an impressive opening weekend box office, it’s beginning to feel like the light at the end of the tunnel is real and Escape Room is a really cool part of that return, something that Miller said he didn’t even know he needed until he was there himself.

“My first movie coming back was Spiral,” he said. “It was great! You forget how breathtaking a giant screen is and the expansiveness of sound and the visceral experience of the theater. It’s only been a year, but I miss it so much. I’m so glad we’re able to get back again.”

Escape Room: Tournament of Champions will release on July 16, 2021, and you could easily argue that it’s a great way to return to the theater! Its unique blend of tension and fun, chills and thrills is perfect to experience with a group of strangers in the dark, and hopefully, exactly what the doctor ordered to fight off some of the pandemic blues.

Check out the trailer for the new film below, and let us know if you’ll be watching!

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‘Immaculate’ Stars Reveal Which Horror Villains They Would “F, Marry, Kill”

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Sydney Sweeney is just coming off the success of her rom-com Anyone But You, but she’s ditching the love story for a horror story in her latest film Immaculate.

Sweeney is taking Hollywood by storm, portraying everything from a love-lusting teenager in Euphoria to an accidental superhero in Madame Web. Although the latter got a lot of hate among theater-goers, Immaculate is getting the polar opposite.

The film was screened at SXSW this past week and was well-received. It also gained a reputation for being extremely gory. Derek Smith of Slant says the, “final act contains some of the most twisted, gory violence this particular subgenre of horror has seen in years…”

Thankfully curious horror movie fans won’t have to wait long to see for themselves what Smith is talking about as Immaculate will hit theaters across the United States on March, 22.

Bloody Disgusting says that the movie’s distributor NEON, in a bit of marketing smarts, had stars Sydney Sweeney and Simona Tabasco play a game of “F, Marry, Kill” in which all their choices had to be horror movie villains.

It’s an interesting question, and you might be surprised at their answers. So colorful are their responses that YouTube slapped an age-restricted rating on the video.

Immaculate is a religious horror movie that NEON says stars Sweeney, “as Cecilia, an American nun of devout faith, embarking on a new journey in a remote convent in the picturesque Italian countryside. Cecilia’s warm welcome quickly devolves into a nightmare as it becomes clear her new home harbors a sinister secret and unspeakable horrors.”

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Michael Keaton Raves About “Beetlejuice” Sequel: A Beautiful and Emotional Return to the Netherworld

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After more than three decades since the original “Beetlejuice” film took audiences by storm with its unique blend of comedy, horror, and whimsy, Michael Keaton has given fans a reason to eagerly anticipate the sequel. In a recent interview, Keaton shared his thoughts on an early cut of the upcoming “Beetlejuice” sequel, and his words have only added to the growing excitement surrounding the film’s release.

Michael Keaton in Beetlejuice

Keaton, reprising his iconic role as the mischievous and eccentric ghost, Beetlejuice, described the sequel as “beautiful”, a term that encapsulates not only the visual aspects of the film but its emotional depth as well. “It is really good. And beautiful. Beautiful, you know, physically. You know what I mean? The other one was so fun and exciting visually. It’s all that, but really kind of beautiful and interestingly emotional here and there. I wasn’t ready for that, you know. Yeah, it’s great,” Keaton remarked during his appearance on The Jess Cagle Show.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

Keaton’s praise did not stop at the film’s visual and emotional appeal. He also lauded the performances of both returning and new cast members, signaling a dynamic ensemble that is sure to please fans. “It’s great and the cast, I mean, Catherine [O’Hara], if you thought she was funny last time, double it. She’s so funny and Justin Theroux is like, I mean, come on,” Keaton enthused. O’Hara returns as Delia Deetz, while Theroux joins the cast in a yet-to-be-disclosed role. The sequel also introduces Jenna Ortega as Lydia’s daughter, Monica Bellucci as Beetlejuice’s wife, and Willem Dafoe as a dead B movie actor, adding new layers to the beloved universe.

“It’s just so fun and I’ve seen it now, I’m gonna see it again after a couple little tweaks in the editing room and I confidently say this thing is great,” Keaton shared. The journey from the original “Beetlejuice” to its sequel has been a long one, but if Keaton’s early rave is anything to go by, it will have been worth the wait. Showtime for the sequel is set for September 6th.

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‘The Unknown’ From Willy Wonka Event is Getting a Horror Movie

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Not since the Fyre Festival has an event been so lambasted online as Glasgow, Scotland’s Willy Wonka Experience. In case you haven’t heard about it, it was a children’s spectacular that celebrated Roald Dahl’s offbeat chocolatier by taking families through a themed space that felt like his magical factory. Only, thanks to cellphone cameras and social testimony, it was actually a sparsely decorated warehouse filled with flimsy set designs that looked like they were bought on Temu.

The famous disgruntled Oompa Loompa is now a meme and several hired actors have spoken out about the inelegant party. But one character seems to have come out on top, The Unknown, the mirror-masked emotionless villain who appears from behind a mirror, terrifying younger attendees. The actor who played Wonka, at the event, Paul Conell, recites his script and gives some backstory to this frightening entity.

“The bit that got me was where I had to say, ‘There is a man we don’t know his name. We know him as the Unknown. This Unknown is an evil chocolate maker who lives in the walls,'” Conell told Business Insider. “It was terrifying for the kids. Is he an evil man who makes chocolate or is the chocolate itself evil?”

Despite the sour affair, something sweet may come out of it. Bloody Disgusting has reported that a horror movie is being made based on The Unknown and may get a release as early as this year.

The horror publication quotes Kaledonia Pictures: “The film, gearing up for production and a late 2024 release, follows a renowned illustrator and his wife who are haunted by the tragic death of their son, Charlie. Desperate to escape their grief, the couple leave the world behind for the remote Scottish Highlands – where an unknowable evil awaits them.”

@katsukiluvrr evil chicolate maker who lives in the walls from willies chocolate experience in glasgow x #glasgow #willywonka #wonkaglasgow #scottish #wonka #theunknown #fyp #trending #foryou ♬ its the unknown – mol💌

They add, “We are excited to begin production and look forward to sharing more with you as soon as possible. We are actually only a few miles from the event, so it is quite surreal to see Glasgow all over social media, worldwide.”

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