Following the critical success of “Emilia Pérez,” which earned a best picture nomination at the Oscars, Netflix has secured French filmmaker Jacques Audiard for an upcoming horror project. The streaming platform has acquired the rights to “La Nuit ravagée,” a horror novel by Jean-Baptiste Del Amo that garnered widespread critical acclaim, and tasked Audiard with bringing it to the screen as a French-language original film.
Set in a fictional suburb outside Toulouse during the early 1990s, the story centers on a group of adolescents drawn to an abandoned house with supernatural properties. When one teenager dies under mysterious circumstances, the remaining friends venture inside, only to discover the structure feeds on their deepest fears and psychological wounds. Published last year, the novel has been celebrated for its homage to 1980s and 1990s horror cinema while weaving together themes of social realism, addressing racism, homophobia and domestic violence alongside coming-of-age anxiety.
Though Audiard has never previously worked in the horror genre, his extensive track record creating narratives about marginalized characters in harsh environments makes him a fitting choice for the material. The director’s recent work “Emilia Pérez,” a Spanish-language musical crime drama, won two Academy Awards and seven César Awards. His commitment to challenging himself with unconventional projects positions him well to deliver a sophisticated horror film that balances genre conventions with the novel’s deeper social themes.
Originally reported by Variety →
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