Movies

'Old': M. Night Shyamalan Wraps Production On His Latest Thriller

Shyamalan thriller
By Ben Pearson

M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense, Glass) has completed principal photography on Old, his upcoming thriller which is based on a French graphic novel. The project started shooting back in late September and wrapped this past weekend. Here's what we know about it so far.

Shyamalan has filmed most of his movies in and around his home base of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, but this story's setting required him to buck tradition and head out to the Dominican Republic to capture the beach locale of the thriller. Old is based on a French graphic novel called Sandcastle, written by Pierre Oscar Levy and illustrated by Frederik Peeters, which the director received as a Father's Day present and liked so much that he purchased the film rights to the project. He wrote, produced, and directed this adaptation.

Here's the description of the graphic novel:

Early morning on a perfect summer's day, people begin to descend on an idyllic, secluded beach. Among their number, a family, a young couple, a refugee and some American tourists. Its fine white sand is fringed with rock pools filled with crystal clear water. The beach is sheltered from prying eyes by green-fringed cliffs that soar around the cove. But this utopia keeps a dark secret. A woman's body is found floating in the waters, which brings these thirteen strangers together to try and unravel the riddle of the sands and escape the beach alive in this tense, fantastical mystery.

But apparently, Old won't be a direct adaptation of the source material. Instead, it will use the graphic novel as an inspiration, with Shyamalan changing some of the details to fit his specific vision. He assembled a pretty impressive cast for this project, including Eliza Scanlen (Little Women, Sharp Objects), Thomasin McKenzie (Jojo Rabbit, Leave No Trace), Vicky Krieps (Phantom Thread), Alex Wolff (Hereditary), Abbey Lee (Mad Max: Fury Road), Nikki Amuka-Bird (Jupiter Ascending), Gael García Bernal (Mozart in the Jungle), and Ken Leung (Lost).

Old hits theaters on July 23, 2021.

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