Most of the movies he's been involved with haven't even been released yet, but writer/director S. Craig Zahler is already becoming a big name in badass cinema. He made his feature directorial debut with the fantastic BONE TOMAHAWK and has since followed that up by directing Vince Vaughn in the prison movie BRAWL IN CELL BLOCK 99 and is moving on from that to the rogue cop film DRAGGED ACROSS CONCRETE with Vaughn and Mel Gibson. He has also scripted the PUPPET MASTER reboot PUPPET MASTER: THE LITTLEST REICH and a serial killer project he wrote called BIG STONE GRID is moving forward with Pierre Morel attached to direct.
But Zahler has more scripts written than he can currently get into production as feature films, so he has teamed with Cinestate for their inaugural Audiostate production. What is Audiostate? Cinestate co-founder Dallas Sonnier explains:
An Audiostate is an opportunity to take a feature film script, create a highly produced audio program based on the script. You'll hear a narrator reading the beautiful prose and the terrific descriptions and all the beauty of the content, professionally mixed in with voiceover performances from actors, with a professional sound mix and a composed score, all in one program."
The first Audiostate release is an audio production of Zahler's script THE NARROW CAVES. Brought to life through vocal performances from Lili Simmons, Wyatt Russell, Vincent D'Onofrio, and Will Patton, the story goes like this:
In Florida, 1983, two college students meet at a yard party and do not hit it off. Walter and Ruby have no reason to reprise this antagonistic encounter, but something strange and almost primordial burgeons within each of them. Their thoughts and dreams turn toward each other, and in very little time they find themselves in an intense and unique relationship. What lies at the bottom of their strange connection is unearthed when Walter joins Ruby on a holiday trip to her home in upstate New York, where a living darkness inhabits the woodlands that surround her family's mansion. This engrossing and unpredictable blend of mystery, horror, and romance subverts the idea of "fated love" while exploring strange compulsions, intense desires, and ancient mysteries that are best left buried deep in the earth.
THE NARROW CAVES has been available for a few weeks now, so some of you reading this article may have already listened to it. It was only brought to my attention last night, though, and I felt this was news worth sharing.
If you're a fan of BONE TOMAHAWK and want to experience a new Zahler script before BRAWL IN CELL BLOCK 99, DRAGGED ACROSS CONCRETE, PUPPET MASTER: THE LITTLEST REICH, or BIG STONE GRID reach screens, head over to Amazon and order THE NARROW CAVES Audiostate.
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