We just got the press release of Somnium, a new indie mystery/sci-fi/thriller that’s been over a decade in the making. Check it out below
*WORLD PREMIERE*
2024 CHATTANOOGA FILM FESTIVAL
Saturday, June 22, 2024
Written & Directed by: Racheal Cain
Starring: Chloë Levine (The OA), Will Peltz (Euphoria), Peter Vack (Someone Great), Johnathon Schaech (Ray Donovan), Clarissa Thibeaux (Runaways), and Grace Van Dien (Stranger Things)
After a painful breakup, small-town Gemma moves to Los Angeles with the hopes of making it big. To get on her feet, she takes a job working the overnight shift at Somnium – a mysterious, experimental sleep clinic where dreams are made real.
Meanwhile, Gemma throws herself into the cutthroat world of Hollywood auditions. But as the pressure to succeed mounts, she begins to experience strange and unsettling phenomena, and soon finds herself trapped in a nightmarish spiral as she discovers a darkness lurking within the clinic walls.
With its gripping storyline and striking cinematography, SOMNIUM drags audiences through the horrifying consequences of tampering with the fabric of reality.
SOMNIUM is written, directed, and produced by Racheal Cain. Produced by Maria Allred, Chris Raby, Patricia Chica, Mike Hatton, Andrea Saavedra, and Ali Mahir Aksu. Executive produced by Chloë Levine, Dan Gregory and Hüseyin Yener. Composed by Peter Ricq. Cinematography by Lance Kuhns. Edited by Kent Lamm. An Allred production
Have a read of the director’s statement from the official press kit
I grew up in the early 90s, making VHS horror movies with the neighborhood kids. I was the only girl alongside a ragtag group of eight boys and the thing we bonded over most was Wes Craven. Halloween was revered in our house and my favourite day of each year was always when the Florida heat finally broke and my dad brought down the cardboard boxes filled with spooky decorations.
I went on to study Film Production at Florida State University, where I learned to make my little horror movies with a real camera and crew. And in August 2011, when my first love broke up with me right before college graduation, I sat on the shadowy curbside outside his house and made a promise to myself. I’d pick myself up, move to LA and do the only thing I knew how: I’d make a scary movie.
All I knew then is that I wanted to make ‘a scary movie about facing fears’. Something I hadn’t seen before: a beautiful horror film. In 2014, a!er completing my first dra! of the script, I began to post about the process on Instagram. Unbeknownst to me, I’d soon connect with my Executive Producers, Cinematographer, Production Designer, and the community which helped me crowdfund my humble budget for phase one of production.
In 2018, myself and a small skeleton crew traveled to southern Georgia to film 20% of the screenplay: all of the lead character’s flashbacks scenes. I knew that part of her story had been written and I was eager to weave in the texture of the authentic passage of time. Ultimately,
five years elapsed between filming those flashbacks and our ‘present day’ scenes in LA.
I could have never imagined the ways in which SOMNIUM would morph and unfold throughout the years, or how profoundly I’d be challenged to grow alongside it, but holding on and seeing it through is what healed me. “at barefoot little girl in a group of eight boys, holding my dad’s Panasonic as they drove plastic knives into their armpits, would be proud.
All the above information from official press release
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