Studio 407’s Leung talks similarly titled horror flicks
Tracing the smoking tire treads left behind by the likes of The Car, Christine and Maximum Overdrive comes the killer car flick Hybrid from Voltage Pictures. Shooting began recently in Regina, Saskatchewan with Eric Valette (Malefique) behind the wheel. But wait a second… Isn’t there already a film in development using that same moniker?
Yes, indeed. Myriad Pictures and Studio 407 have a creature feature entitled Hybrid that’s getting ready to roll cameras later this year.
“We’re actually involved in both films and what happened was the original name of the film Eric is shooting right now was called Hunter,” explains Alex Leung, Managing Director at Studio 407, the comic book label who recently partnered with Myriad (details). “It’s an action horror film as well. Our producing partners and sales agent Voltage Pictures needed to change the title because they felt it did not do the movie service. It didn’t imply what the film was, so they wanted to find a temporary name they could use without realizing that we also had another film also called Hybrid with another company.”
“We’re now producing two films called ‘Hybrid,'” Leung says, laughing about the obvious misunderstanding. “[Voltage] will change their title, they’re looking for a new one now – the comic book for our other Hybrid is coming out soon so we can’t really change the title.”
Studio 407 plans to release a comic book based on the Hybrid/Hunter concept later down the road, which was the plan all along until a film deal was put into place.
“Hunter actually started off as a script written by Neal Marshall Stevens [of Thirteen Ghosts] and I’ve had a long relationship with him,” says Leung. “We thought it would make a great comic book and while we were doing that, I was feeling out the film side. It happened faster than I thought and I engaged this company called Stallion Media which co-financed Southland Tales and The Punisher 2. They got it started and essentially put it into overdrive.”
Oded Fehr (of the Resident Evil and Mummy films), Shannon Beckner (pictured in an official still from the film), Ryan Kennedy and Melanie Papalia star in this story of “four police car mechanics who are trapped in an underground garage with a car which seems to be hunting them down,” says Leung, who’s wearing an executive producer cap on the picture. “It’s very much like Christine and Death Proof. It’s a bio-mechanical thing. You really don’t know who’s driving at first, it’s a mystery. Is it supernatural, a serial killer? But then we find out it’s an [H.R.] Giger-esque thing under the hood.”
More to come on that other Hybrid film soon!
Source: Ryan Rotten
