In A Violent Nature: Shudder/IFC’s unrated slasher flick gets gnarly retro lobby cards

Last Updated on June 3, 2024

Shudder and IFC Film are on a roll. Their release, Late Night With the Devil, wracked up a truly impressive $10 million gross at the domestic box office this winter, despite only being in limited release and only playing during a short window before its streaming debut. They’re also getting a lot of fresh critical attention for Caitlin Cronenberg’s debut, Humane (check out our interview with the director here).  Horror fans love Shudder (including us), and sure enough, it looks like they might have another big winner on their hands with the violent slasher flick In a Violent Nature.

In the lead-up to the film’s theatrical debut on May 31st, IFC’s issued four retro-style lobby cards that bring to mind some of the seventies classics the movie is vibing on, like The Hills Have Eyes, The Last House on the Left, and (natch) Friday the 13th. Check them out out:

I caught In a Violent Nature at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year (read my review). While I wasn’t as crazy about it as some other horror critics there, watching it on the big screen was indeed a gnarly experience. Director Chris Nash’s retro flick does something interesting in that it takes the perspective of our monstrous, masked hero as he tracks down and kills his victims. It’s like Terrence Malick meets Sean S. Cunningham, with it adopting the now trendy minimalist 1:33:1 arthouse aspect ratio but then filling it with some truly mind-blowing carnage. Again, I didn’t feel like the movie entirely worked, but I still found it entertaining, with some of the goriest kills outside of the Terrifier franchise in recent memory. While it’ll likely do great numbers on Shudder, this is a movie designed to be watched in movie theaters, and with the unrated cut going semi-wide, legit horror fans owe it to themselves to check it out.

What’s your favorite Shudder movie so far? Let us know in the comments!