While THE DARKEST HOUR wasn’t a formal part of Comic-Con this year, Summit did present some footage from the film, as well as a detailed look at some production art earlier this morning. The Timur Bekmambetov produced alien invasion flick stars Emile Hirsch, Rachel Taylor, Olivia Thirbly and Max Minghella as a group of Americans in Moscow on business who find themselves at the center of an alien attack.
With a number of “aliens attacking” films in the past few years – SKYLINE, BATTLE: LOS ANGELES and the upcoming COWBOYS & ALIENS – the production team hoped to make something a little different with their film. At the very least, they’ve done as much with the aliens. The aliens are here on Earth looking for electricity and are largely invisible. All we see of them are some electric tendrils (for lack of a better word) that they use to manipulate the human environment.
They come to Earth in the beginning of the movie and systematically wipe out all the major cities and extinguish all electric-powered devices. Humans are basically reduced to ash in mere seconds.
We caught a glimpse of the trailer, which starts off very familiar with the abandoned landscapes after an alien attack but once we see our survivors interacting with the alien forces, it turns interesting. They realize that as the aliens horde electricity, they unwittingly power up devices when nearby. So they use lightbulbs as early warning signs, which leads to some interesting visuals to build the tension.
The movie will be partnered with a comic series from artists like Ben Templesmith, Pia Guerra and Mateus Santolouco that highlights what happened during the invasion in other cities across the world. The series will be released by Oni Press before THE DARKEST HOUR hits theaters this December. Check out some new art and stills from the movie below and keep your eye out for the trailer for the film, which will be in theaters next week with COWBOYS & ALIENS.