Nightmare Alley final trailer arrives ahead of December theatrical release

Director Guillermo del Toro‘s Nightmare Alley is set to receive a wide theatrical release on December 17th, courtesy of Searchlight Pictures, and with just four weeks to go until the film reaches the big screen its final trailer has arrived online! You can check it out in the embed above. We saw the previous trailer back in September.

Based on a novel by William Lindsay Gresham (which was previously turned into a movie in 1947), Nightmare Alley is a noir thriller set in “a world of carnival hustlers and con men, telling the story of a mentalist who teams with a psychologist in order to swindle the rich.” Here’s the official synopsis:

When charismatic but down-on-his-luck Stanton Carlisle endears himself to clairvoyant Zeena and her has-been mentalist husband Pete at a traveling carnival, he crafts a golden ticket to success, using this newly acquired knowledge to grift the wealthy elite of 1940s New York society. With the virtuous Molly loyally by his side, Stanton plots to con a dangerous tycoon with the aid of a mysterious psychiatrist who might be his most formidable opponent yet.

The film stars Bradley Cooper as Stanton Carlisle, Toni Collette as Zeena, David Strathairn as Pete, Rooney Mara as Molly, Richard Jenkins as the “dangerous tycoon”, and Cate Blanchett as the “mysterious psychiatrist”. Also in the cast are Willem Dafoe, Mary Steenburgen, Ron Perlman, Holt McCallany, Clifton Collins Jr., Tim Blake Nelson, Jim Beaver, and David Hewlett. 

Copies of Gresham’s novel Nightmare Alley can be purchased at THIS LINK. Del Toro wrote the adaptation with Kim Morgan, and has said that it was necessary to heavily rework the story to fit it into a feature running time. Speaking with Vanity Fair, del Toro said a more straightforward adaptation would result in a six hour mini-series with shifting perspectives.

Del Toro’s Nightmare Alley has been rated R for “strong/bloody violence, some sexual content, nudity and language.”